Current study empirically investigates the effect of various socio-economic and law enforcement variables on crime rate by using cross-sectional time series data set of 35 districts of Punjab. An Interaction term of police strength with economic activity and divisional analysis on the basis of more or less crime dense districts has empirically proved that magnitude of deterrence effect of increasing police strength in a community depends upon its allocation regarding some specific characteristics of that area. An increase in Population growth and increase in Untraced Criminal cases by crime prevention authorities have a significant positive impact on crime rate of a society. While an increase in Economic Activity and Education level have a significant negative impact on crime rate. Initial findings have been obtained by applying fixed effect modal which are quite consistent with Log-linear, Least Square Dummy variable, Interaction term and Divisional analysis models that can be taken as robustness of our empirical findings. Furthermore, an empirical finding has revealed a strong positive relationship of increase in Police strength on crime rate of Lahore division which is indicating of low efficiency of police department in respective years. Current study stands distinct regarding policy purposes as it indicates a clear idea about allocation and performance of police in various divisions of Punjab along with identifying the socio-economic and demographic determinants of crime.
Shahzad et al. (Wed,) studied this question.