Former Rochdale police officer receives OBE for community work

Photo: Yui Mok/PA Wire

A former police officer form Rochdale has been made an OBE in the New Year’s Honours list for his community work.

Asrar Ul-Haq, 60, who worked as a police officer for 30 years, was recognised for his work bringing together people from different faiths and backgrounds for a common good.

Over his 30 years, among Asrar’s proudest moments are coordinating a Greater Manchester-wide operation in the run up to Christmas, which resulted in more than 520 arrests in 24 hours and helping to develop GMPs response to antisocial behaviour.

He also developed a national scheme to encourage officers from under-represented groups to apply for accelerated promotion and is currently a trustee of Rochdale AFC Trust and a Deputy Lieutenant to the Lord-Lieutenant of Greater Manchester.

Despite his numerous achievements, Asrar said he was surprised to find out he had been awarded an OBE.

“It was quite a surprise because it’s one of those things that you don’t expect,” said Asrar.

“There’s ordinary people in Rochdale doing their bit and for this to happen and you think really! It was a really good surprise and it made me realise that someone's gone to the trouble of writing this out so they value the work that I do, which is pleasing.”

Asrar moved to England in 1967 and lived on Moss Street, Rochdale with his four brothers and one sister who all attended Kingsway and then Balderstone High Schools.

After Asrar graduated with a degree in Applied Sciences he was posted to Rochdale, later becoming the force’s first detective of Asian heritage.

He added that he was partly-inspired to join the police by his great-grandfather who was a Head Constable and his grandfather who was an Inspector in the police under the British Raj.

“I had grown up with a great deal of respect for the police,” he said.

“I had also grown up during the riots (Toxteth and London). I had seen how badly the police treated people and I wanted to help change that. I don’t think of myself as a trailblazer but I guess in some respects I was.”

However, in his early life Asrar said he experienced a lot of racism on the estate where he grew up in Rochdale.

He said: “It was a really rough estate in those days. It was very racist, very rough. We were subjected to racism and had our windows broken quite regularly.

“We had the national front skinheads that used to come to our school regularly and they used to call it ‘paki bashing’ and it used to be a sport for them.

“The police never turned up and we had to look after ourselves in the ways we knew best.”

He added that the abuse didn’t stop when he joined the police, but the force has transformed radically since then.

Asrar said:  “At that time the police were racist, sexist and homophobic. It was the same across the country.

“When I joined, the term 'paki' was quite widely used. Since then the organisation has gone through radical changes and now there’s far more Asian police officers and gay police officers.”

His work led to him being awarded for innovation and for inspirational leadership as well as raising £10,000 for Cancer Research UK as part of a steering committee.

As a police officer Asrar said his family and religious values drove him to help people.

He said he would regularly speak to homeless people and sex workers when working as the inspector in charge of policing in Manchester city centre,

“Previously, my thought was these are bad people but when you start speaking to them you realise it started changing my perception and see what we can do to help instead of locking them up and putting them before the courts,” he said.

“On a personal level I wanted to make my parents proud. As most Asian parents they came to this country with very little and any tiny success was something they could be proud of.

“There were so many great moments. The fact I’ve arrested somebody and they can come up and shake my hand, makes me feel good that I did something in the right way.”

Mrs Diane Hawkins JP LLB HM Lord-Lieutenant of Greater Manchester said Asrar’s award was thoroughly well deserved.

She said: “He was an exceptional professional as a Police Officer and had a major impact locally and nationally and, following his retirement, his productive professional life continues, assisting the National Crime Agency and as a non-Magistrate member of the Greater Manchester Advisory Committee.

“He became a Deputy Lieutenant in 2021 and is a great addition. His voluntary work, both individually and with his family, supporting and bringing communities together, has stood him in great stead and he has had a very positive effect on the Lieutenancy partnership with the DofE Award Scheme in Greater Manchester in addition to carrying out duties on my behalf.”

In retirement Asrar went to Greece on beach rescue operations helping displaced people fleeing from war-torn areas and set up cinemas for the children using PowerPoint projectors and old bedsheets.

Recently, he has also started the Amaani Initiative, a community project aimed at reducing carbon emissions, which began by planting olive trees in Mosques.

More than 500 trees have now been planted in the borough as Asrar helped develop Mosques in Bloom and Churches in Bloom and received an award from the Royal Horticultural Society for his work.

His aim now is to create a monument in Rochdale to the  the sacrifices made by the 4 million soldiers from South Asian who fought alongside British soldiers in World War One and Two.