Foreign-educated police officer resigns after 'verbal abuse' by Lahore CCPO

ISLAMABAD: A sub-inspector of the Punjab police has resigned from his post after Lahore police chief Umar Sheikh allegedly verbally berated him during an official meeting, The News has reported. 

Fahad Iftikhar Virk, in his two-line resignation letter, said that he is unable to serve the police department any longer after the humiliating experience.

Virk told The News that Sheikh had called him an idiot (khotay ka bacha) when he (Virk) incorrectly answered a question in a meeting chaired by the Capital City Police Officer (CCPO) on September 22. 

Virk said he felt deeply insulted and immediately resigned from his position after the encounter.

Virk said he had been in charge of the media monitoring cell and was briefing Sheikh and other officers on a matter related to his portfolio.

“The CCPO asked me a question, which I answered. While I was replying, he interrupted and called me a ‘khotay ka bacha,’ saying he was asking me something but was getting an answer to something else,” Virk told the newspaper.

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Virk said he completed his MPhil degree in environmental chemistry from the United States in 2015. He said serving in the police had always been his passion, which is why he appeared in the competitive examination of the Punjab Public Service Commission and was placed at number 10 on the merit list.

He said he resigned because he felt his dignity was severely attacked.

“I was asked to get out of the meeting, which I had to. I later wrote out my resignation to the senior superintendent of police (SSP), Lahore,” said Virk.

Cop writes letter to IGP against CCPO

Separately, a reader of the deputy superintendent of police (DSP), Baghbanpura Circle, Lahore, has also written a three-page letter to the Inspector General Police (IGP) Punjab for an impartial inquiry in a case registered against him and another police officer on the "orders of the CCPO".

The case had been registered against Reader Syed Zaigham Abbas and the DSP’s gunman Mohammad Yousuf.

The letter, which is available with The News, requests that the inquiry not be conducted by any subordinate of the CCPO, alleging that it would not be impartial and fair as all officers of Lahore work under Sheikh. 

Abbas claimed that Yousuf received a call from the CCPO’s telephone operator Saeed, who asked him to connect him to the DSP. However, this could not be done as the official was praying.

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Eventually, the CCPO talked to the DSP and directed him to appear in his office along with Abbas and Yousuf. Abbas claimed that when they got there, the two of them had to hear some harsh language from the CCPO. They alleged that the CCPO also ordered the DSP to register a criminal case against the two.

On the other hand, the CCPO's office sources said Sheikh has been in the line of fire ever since he took charge. They said the allegations against the Lahore police chief were a distortion of facts, and he was ready to face any inquiry.

Originally published in The News