The Inspector General of Police (IGP), Riffat Mukhtar Raja, provided information about the proclaimed offenders (POs) in the region during a recent hearing at the Sindh High Court (SHC).
The official figures show that Sindh has 50,058 POs. On top of the list, Larkana district courts have designated 23,257 people as POs.
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The District East courts in Karachi declared 6,102 people to be POs, followed by the District South courts with 4,252, the District West courts with 1,908, the District Hyderabad courts with 6,282, the District Mirpurkhas courts with 536, the District Nawabshah courts with 2,126, the District Sukkur courts with 4,987, and the Sindh CTD with 608 declarations.
The enormous number of POs who were freely traversing the area infuriated the SHC. It censured the police force for its unsatisfactory performance.
The court mandated that the Home Department provide the information regarding each PO to the Interior Ministry, the National Database Registration Authority, and the State Bank of Pakistan in order to block their bank accounts and invalidate their passports and national identity cards.
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The decision was made during a hearing on the extradition of former MQM leader Hammad Siddiqui in connection with the Baldia factory fire case. Altaf Hussain, the founder of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, Adeel, Khalil Ahmed, Rashid Iqbal, and Adnan Chiwara are among the political figures who have been proclaimed POs by courts and who currently reside in Dubai, Saudi Arabia, Germany, and London, respectively.
The SHC also requested that the IGP take action to detain the POs in the province and divulge information on those who have already been detained. The cancellation of the CNICs for Khurrum Nisar, Syed Taqi Haider Shah, and Hammad Siddiqui was disclosed to the court by IGP Riffat Mukhtar.