Two women officers in the Mansehra district of KPK have been taking on the customs of a patriarchal society as a challenge for their jobs and want to bring a positive change through effective and efficient administration.
Mansehra is the only district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa where two women officers are posted in police and food departments. The presence of Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP) Sonia Shimroz Khan and Assistant Food Controller (AFC) Uzma Shah is strange for local people, who are in the habit of seeing only men officers in the district. However, both the officers have proven their efficiency and dedication with their work in their respective fields.
“Women are weak and keep weeping over emotional issues but I am in police to prove it wrong,” said ASP Sonia Shimroz Khan, the first woman police officer in the province.
She said women were joining army, air force and other fields but they were reluctant to join the police department. “I would ask them to come in this field too to bring a change in the society,” she added.
Ms Khan said that a woman officer could understand issues of women in a better way and could also address the same easily. “Although we have been facing difficulties while working in the field yet I think now a conservative society like that of Mansehra has started accepting women officers in different departments,” she said.
Ms Khan also claimed that crime rate in her beat had drastically came down as she personally patrolled the area at night and kept check on her subordinates. “I love and enjoy my profession despite the hectic routine. I sacrificed domestic life for a noble cause,” she added.
AFC Uzma Shah is also the first woman officer in the food department in the entire province. She also wanted to join a dynamic job except health and education departments as according to her more than 80 per cent women prefer to join these two departments.
“The society is yet to accept women as officers but I am optimistic that the notion will vanish soon. I regularly pay surprise visits to bazaars and raid shops and markets and confiscated items injurious to health,” said Ms Shah.
The regular checking of sale of unhygienic foods and eatables is part of job of Ms Shah and when she recently launched a crackdown on fake beverages, unhygienic goods in Baffa, the local traders stormed her official vehicle but the issues was amicably settled after the interference ofthe police.
“Such tactics and protests cannot dent my resolve to curb sale of unhygienic items and eatables which are unfit for human consumption,” she said.
Ms Shah said that law allowed officers of food department to impose minimum fine of Rs5,000 on violators which sometime infuriated small traders, who put resistance.
“When we talk of consumers right at the same time we should also take up the issues faced by business community particularly of small traders. I think minimum fine limit of Rs5,000 should be decreased so as small traders could pay it,” said Ms Shah.
