The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) on April 8 noted with concern that the state of law and order in Karachi, the provincial capital of Sindh, had “deteriorated alarmingly”, reports Dawn. Karachi has been facing an increase in street crime in recent months. Data presented before a high-level security meeting last week showed more than 250 Karachiites were shot dead and 1,052 others were wounded by street criminals between 2022 and March 28, 2024. In a post on social media platform X, the HRCP said: “Tens of thousands of street crimes were registered by the police in 2023, in which over a hundred people lost their lives. The first quarter of 2024 has followed the same pattern.” The HRCP pointed out that that retaliatory vigilantism and increased brutality by citizens in response to the crime wave was “not the answer”, adding that the government’s failure to address rising crime levels was “shocking”. “The underlying factors such as economic desperation and unemployment need to be addressed urgently as well,” HRCP stressed.
On April 7, Karachi Police Chief Additional Inspector General Imran Yaqoob said that the crime rate in the city has been recorded at 166 cases per day which according to him is less than one per Police Station, reports ARY News. Briefing Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah and other participants of a meeting called to discuss the law-and-order situation in the city, Imran Yaqoob said that the crime rate in the other big cities of other provinces is higher than Karachi. “But even then, the situation is being controlled through extensive checking, patrolling and intelligence.