SC directs officials to launch advertisement campaign against drugs on social media

The Supreme Court on Friday, while hearing a suo motu case on the use of drugs in private as well as government educational institutions, rejected the report submitted by the Lahore police and ordered that an advertisement campaign be launched on social media against drugs.

Advertisements to create awareness should be run from tomorrow, said Chief Justice Mian Saqib Nisar, adding that the police to dissuade [the court] comes up with a report about how many [people] have been arrested and how many have been let go.

He directed all four provincial chief secretaries, the in-charge of the anti-narcotics division, and secretaries of other relevant ministries to call a meeting and devise an action plan within a week.

The development comes a day after the Punjab government decided to launch a campaign against narcotics in schools. “A special campaign will be launched in educational institutions to save them from narcotics and a committee has been constituted to work on this issue,” Punjab Schools Education Minister Murad Raas said at a meeting with private school owners on Thursday.

“The National Action Plan was enforced to tackle terrorism; similarly, a plan should be made against drugs,” said Justice Ijazul Ahsan during today’s hearing, equating the dangerous affects of drugs on the young generation to the impact of terrorism.

The hearing was adjourned for a week.

A civil society member, Abdullah Malik, had last year submitted his application before the chief justice during a hearing of human rights cases at the Lahore registry of the Supreme Court.

Malik has said easy availability of drugs in educational institutions was destroying the lives of students while the government took no action. He said the Punjab government had committed criminal negligence by not launching a crackdown on drug peddlers. He said the future of the country would be at risk if the students were not rescued from the menace of drugs.