Afew days after the Union Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad pointed fingers on Pakistan for infusing drugs into the country, especially Punjab, Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Badal on Wednesday directed all the Police Commissioners and Senior Superintendents of Police (SSPs) to launch a concerted drive against drug peddlers and show concrete results within a month.
Reviewing the law and order situation in the State in a high level meeting, Sukhbir directed the police officers to strike at the root of the drug trade and not just be content with arresting drug peddlers. “You must investigate forward and backward linkages,” said Sukhbir, adding there must be “zero tolerance” towards drugs.
He said that though there was a quantum increase in the recovery of narcotics, this should not make the force complacent as peddlers were still trying to induce youth to take to drugs. Asking the district police chiefs to conduct micro analysis of their own districts to check the flow of drugs, sale and its resale, Sukhbir said that all drug peddlers would have to be dealt with an iron hand.
Agreeing with the suggestion of State DGP Sumedh Singh Saini regarding weeding out of all those police personnel found colluding with drug peddlers, he said that weeding out of “rotten eggs” had to begin from the top. Besides intelligence and other sources, he was regularly getting feedback from many formal and informal channels regarding the problem of drug addiction in the State and any SSP not performing in his area would have to lose the command of the district, he made it clear.
The State top cop informed the Deputy Chief Minister, who also holds the Home portfolio, that the Punjab Police had already stepped up its drive against drug addiction and more than 6,300 drug peddlers and drug lords had been arrested since April 1, 2013.
Sukhbir stressed upon smashing the “supply chain”. Giving a clear direction to identify and weed out corrupt elements from the police, he said that any officer suspended due to charges of corruption would be automatically debarred from any public dealing post in rest of his career. Expressing concern over reports about inaccessibility of SSPs in some districts, Sukhbir issued directions that every SSP would be available to the public on mobile phones for 24 hours.
“Mobile phones of SSPs and Commissioners of Police should be widely publicised to the general public. Every SSP must listen to complaints of general public from 11am to 1pm on all working days. In case they are out of the district, they must depute the next senior officer to listen to public complaints in their place”, he added. Sukhbir also issued directions to Powercom to provide 24X7 power hotlines to all police control rooms.