Ayub Park CheckPost
By Col. Riaz Jafri (Retd.)
Westridge, Rawalpindi
One wonders if the JCP (Joint Police and Army Check Post) on GT Road near Ayub Park for checking incoming traffic from Rawat serves any useful purpose or has apprehended any miscreants till date except for causing untold misery and agony daily to the hundreds of commuters from both DHAs and BahriaTown going to Pindi/Islamabad.
All sorts of vehicles including Emergency Vehicle (ambulances etc.) are held up here forming almost half a mile long bumper to bumper eight deep queues that makes it almost impossible for the poor soldier to check the boot of any car and he can only cast a cursory glance at the occupants inside the car, especially during the dark hours of the night. An interesting fact is that before this check post there are quite a few alternate routes available for anyone to bypass it; such as going through BahriaTown Phase IV, High Court Road, Kotha Kalan and AttockOil Refinery, etc.
Apart from causing great misery to the commuters daily, what the authorities don’t realize is that they are offering a very lucrative target to the terrorists. At any given time there are scores and scores of vehicles – cars, wagons and even oil tankers – stuck bumper to bumper at the check point or moving literally at a snail’s pace. What if one of these very vehicles is a car bomb and the suicidal terrorist blows it up in the midst of the huge assembly of vehicles, none of which can move either forward or backwards, making them all explode in turn? And God forbid if there is an oil tanker around, one can imagine the inferno it would cause for the travelers and those around who would not have any chance to survive at all.
The best course of action would be to shift this check post to an open and wide road space area near Rawat on GT Road to avoid congestion as well as deny the alternate routes to the miscreants.
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