LAHORE: The capital city police have so far arrested seven people and detained 42 others out of total 113 mentioned in the list of `hardcore` activists of banned militant outfit.

All units of Lahore police in association with intelligence agencies are conducting raids in all parts of the city to pick suspects from their residential properties and are in the process of obtaining detention orders nowadays to intensify arrests.

Official statistics available with Dawn show that seven arrests which followed the registration of as many FIRs and 42 detentions have been made as of Feb 11.

Majority of detainees are fourth schedulers because of their connections with militants, sectarian and proscribed organisations.

According to 11EE [proscription of person] of AntiTerrorism Act 1997, the federal government may list a person as proscribed in the Fourth Schedule, if there are reasonable grounds to believe that the person is involved in terrorism, an activist or officebearer of an organisation kept under observation or involved in terrorism and sectarianism.

The Act includes that a person who is listed in Fourth Schedule may take following actions, the man should execute a bond with one or more sureties to the satisfaction of the district police officer (DPO) in the territorial limits he lived. He also required a written permission from station house officer (SHO) of the concerned area before moving from his permanent place of residence for any period of time and keeps him informed about the place he would be visiting.

The proscribed persons could not visit schools, colleges and other institutions where persons under 21 years of age are given education, training and housed permanently or temporarily without the permission of the officer in-charge of the police station within whose jurisdiction such place is situated.

Deputy Inspector General (DIG Operations) Dr Haider Ashraf told Dawn that they had detained the fourth schedulers to curb terrorism and sectarianism. He said on the direction of district intelligence committee the security agencies had decided to act promptly before happening of any untoward incident.

The DIG said security personnel had been recovering arms and hate material such as pamphlets, audio and video CDs from the custody of proscribed men by conducting operation in different areas of the city. Different law-enforcement agencies had participated in the operation, he added.

He said the arrested men belongedto different sects.

Meanwhile, police arrested three suspected terrorists on Thursday.

According to a news release on Thursday, Deputy Inspector General (Operations) Dr Haider Ashraf said three terrorists, identified as Irfan, Hafiz Ghulam Fareed and Abdul Jabbar, belonging to banned outfits, were arrested from different areas of the city. They were wanted in terrorism cases.

Mr Ashraf said Ghalib Marketpolice also had arrested Hafiz Yasir Jagranvi, who was on the Fourth Schedule list of the Anti-Terrorism Act, and recovered a huge quantity of hate material, including pamphlets, books and digital material, from his house.

He further said that since the launch of National Action Plan against terrorism, police had registered 1,500 cases against more than 2,000 persons for delivering hate speeches or misusing loudspeakers.