Rangers' action against individuals, institutions only after govt's nod

KARACHI: The Sindh Assembly on Wednesday passed a resolution on giving special policing powers to the Rangers, limiting the force with the condition to take prior permission from the Sindh chief minister for taking action against any individual, institution and making arrests on suspicion.

The provincial assembly passed the resolution with four conditions on special powers for carrying out raids and to arrest suspects.

The resolution presented by Home Minister Sohail Anwer Sial amid chants and slogans confined the paramilitary forces to taking action only against target killings, extortion, kidnappings for ransom and sectarian killings.

The Rangers were given special policing powers following the start of a surgical operation in 2012. Their powers expired on the night of December 6.

The resolution was rejected by the opposition, including the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) and Pakistan Muslim League-Functional (PML-F) as the members of these parties tore apart the copies of the resolution and later walked out of the session.

The resolution said that the Sindh government entrusted certain functions to the Pakistan Rangers (Sindh) to assist the civil administration and police under the Article 147 of the Constitution making it mandatory for such decision of the Sindh government to be ratified by the provincial assembly within 60 days.

The resolution, distributed to the media on plain paper, said whereas the law and order situation in general had improved due to the joint efforts of the Sindh Police and Pakistan Rangers (Sindh) and the Sindh government, since July 16, 2015 for extension in the special policing powers to the Rangers for a period of 12 months in aid of police and civil administration for maintenance of law and orders hereby ratified the resolution.

1. The resolution which was presented with a few conditions states that Rangers will only have powers of: a) Target killing b) Extortion/Bhatta c) Kidnapping for ransom d) Sectarian killing.

2) that any person who is not directly involved in terrorism and is only suspected of aiding and abetting terrorists or by way of terror financing or facilitating terrorists shall not be placed under preventive detention under any law without prior written approval of the government of Sindh i.e. Sindh chief minister. It is clarified that in case a person is suspected of the above, cogent reasons with complete evidence justifying such preventive detention shall be provided to Government of Sindh, which will, based on the available evidence, approve or reject such proposal of preventive detention, it said. The resolution clearly indicated that powers of the Rangers regarding 90-day detention of the suspects have been curtailed.

3) The Pakistan Rangers (Sindh) shall not raid any office of the Government of Sindh or any other government authority without prior written approval of the Chief Secretary, Government of Sindh.

4) That Pakistan Rangers (Sindh) shall not assist any other institution/organsiation apart from Sindh Police in carrying out its actions.

5) That it is further resolved that Government of Sindh whilst granting any powers to Pakistan Rangers (Sindh) and Sindh Police shall take into accounts all of the above conditions.—Originally published in The News