The New Nation - Internet Edition

Mamunur Rashid

A little less than half the motor vehicles of the Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP) are either out of order or unworthy of plying on the road, let alone serving the purpose of efficiently preventing burgeoning crime in the city.

At least 40 per cent of the vehicles are 15 to 20 years old. The past governments failed miserably to solve the transport problem of the city police, according to DMP sources.

The sources said, in the city of about 1.5 crore people there are only 23,000 police personnel with only 614 transports, out of them, 40 per cent are out of order.

The DMP has 33 police stations and a pool of 614 vehicles. Of them, 69 are fully damaged for the last five years. As many as 545 dilapidated vehicles are running on the road with some 50 to 60 vehicles visiting the DMP workshop off and on. There are about 1,050 Chinese motorbikes for police patrol duty in the city.

The prison vans of Dhaka Central Jail are at least 32 years old. Transportation of prisoners in these rickety vans to and from the court to the jail and sometimes from one jail to another has always been a nightmarish job for the prison officials.

The DMP source said they need at least another 2,000 vehicles to effectively check crime in a city where criminality has recently increased considerably.

DMP authority has completed proposal papers and sent to the Police Headquarters to immediately import 1200 new vehicles. The HQ will send the proposal to the Table of Organiser and Equipments (TO&E) at the Establishment Ministry for its approval.

As the past governments have not taken any initiative to added new vehicles to ease the transportation problem of the city police forces since independence, the city police continued to requisition private vehicles on a daily basis.

Around 200 vehicles are requisitioned by the DMP every day. The number is often increased due to political situations and the government's special needs, the sources added.

According to the existing laws on requisitioning, a vehicle can be requisitioned for the highest seven days against everyday payment of Tk 500 to its owner and Tk 50 each to its driver and helper as meal allowance.

Most of the DMP vehicles are Mitsubishi L-200 model, Nissan patrol, Isuzu pick up, Kaya pickup and Chinese motorbikes.

Only recently three new Jeeps and four pickup vans were added to the DMP motor pool.

In the midst of this shortage of vehicles 129 transports have been given to the 33 police stations and 41 to Detective Branch of Police. The highest allocation of 7 vehicles has been made for Ramna Police Station and the lowest of 2 to Dakkhin Khan Police Station. But most of the vehicles are in a very bad condition.

The DMP has a motor workshop but without logistics support it cannot function smoothly.

Sudip Kumar Chakrabarty Assistant Commissioner (AC) of the Motor Transport (AC-MT) Department told the New Nation that DMP would overcome their transport problem very soon. Now, the DMP authority is taking strong initiatives to solve the Police transport problem in the city.