LAHORE: Defence C police have arrested 14 proclaimed offenders with criminal records in an intensified drive against absconders, with some of those detained having evaded the law for as long as two decades.
DIG Operations Faisal Kamran said those arrested include Abbas, Imtiaz, Nadeem, Jawad and Rashid, among others.
A police spokesperson said the suspects were taken into custody through action based on information obtained during patrolling, at checkpoints, and from various other sources.
Police said the arrested proclaimed offenders had been wanted by Lahore Police for a long period in cases involving bogus cheques, theft and other offences. Some of the suspects had remained beyond the reach of the law for the past 20 years.
The designation carries specific legal weight. Under Section 87 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, a court may publish a written proclamation requiring an absconding accused to appear at a specified place and time, ordinarily not less than 30 days from publication. If the accused fails to appear, Section 88 permits attachment of their property.
A person so proclaimed is recorded on the district’s proclaimed offenders register, which is maintained by each police division and periodically reviewed by senior officers. Arrest of a proclaimed offender restores the original case to the trial track, and absconding itself can attract separate prosecution.
The presence of suspects on the register for two decades points to the structural challenge in this category of enforcement: proclaimed offenders frequently relocate outside the district, change identity documents, or return to their original localities only after the investigating officers who handled their cases have been transferred.
The spokesperson said close security monitoring is continuing across the city and that action against criminal elements is being made more effective.
DIG Operations Faisal Kamran said Lahore Police are following a zero-tolerance policy on the arrest of proclaimed offenders, and that operations will continue in order to protect the lives and property of citizens.
The Defence C operation is one strand of a broader enforcement push across Lahore’s divisions over recent weeks. Lahore Police recently arrested 69 people in a sweeping crackdown on usurers, and parallel drives are running against the display of weapons and aerial firing, against narcotics supply, and against kite manufacturing and sale.
Proclaimed-offender drives have become a recurring performance metric for divisional police in Punjab, with divisional SPs required to report monthly clearance against the register. The approach has produced significant arrest numbers, though the durability of the outcome depends on what follows — specifically, whether the restored trials proceed to conclusion rather than stalling again on non-appearance.
The 14 arrested suspects will be produced before the relevant courts in the cases in which they were declared absconders. Cases have been registered where required and further legal proceedings have begun.
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