Sacrificing Our TODAY for the World's TOMORROW
FATA is "Federally Administered Tribal Area" of Pakistan; consisting of 7 Agencies and 6 F.Rs; with a 27000 Sq Km area and 4.5 m population.
MYTH: FATA is the HUB of militancy, terrorism and unrest in Afghanistan.
REALITY: FATA is the worst "VICTIM of Militancy”. Thousands of Civilians dead & injured; Hundreds of Schools destroyed; Thousands of homes raised to ground; 40% population displaced from homes.
Showing posts with label PKSociety. Show all posts
Showing posts with label PKSociety. Show all posts

Saturday, April 30, 2011

Organ Trade in Pakistan Booming again - ’پاکستان میں اعضاء کی تجارت پھر شروع‘


   بی بی سی اردو ڈاٹ کام :Courtesy

’پاکستان میں اعضاء کی تجارت پھر شروع‘

پاکستان میں ڈاکٹروں کی تنظیموں نے انکشاف کیا ہے کہ ملک میں اعضاء کی تجارت کا سلسلہ ایک مرتبہ پھر شروع ہوگیا ہے۔
اس بات کا انکشاف پاکستان ٹرانسپلانٹ سوسائٹی کے صدر ڈاکٹر ادیب رضوی نے جمعہ کو کراچی میں ایک پریس کانفرنس میں کیا۔
نامہ نگار ریاض سہیل کے مطابق ڈاکٹر رضوی نے بتایا کہ پاکستان دو ہزار سات تک اعضا کی فروخت کی بین الاقوامی منڈی کی حیثیت اختیار کر چکا تھا مگر ڈاکٹروں اور سول سوسائیٹی کے جدوجہد کے بعد دو ہزار سات میں قانون سازی کے لیے کوششیں ہوئیں اور اس کاروبار میں ایکدم کمی آگئی اور دو ہزار دس میں اعضا کی پیوندکاری کا قانون بننے کے بعد یہ کاروبار بند ہوگیا تھا مگر ایک مرتبہ پھر اس میں جان پڑ گئی ہے۔

Displaced Persons (IDPs) of FATA, A Story of Ordeals - خیبر پختونخواہ کے متاثرین کی نئی شناخت

  بی بی سی اردو ڈاٹ کام :Courtesy

خیبر پختونخواہ کے متاثرین کی نئی شناخت

فائل فوٹو 
پاکستان کے قبائلی علاقوں میں فوجی آپریشن سے متاثر ہو کر نقل مکانی کرنے والے کو ایک نئی شناخت ملی ہے۔ ان افراد سےجب بھی کہا جاتا ہے کہ وہ اپنا تعارف کرا دیں تو ان کا جواب ہوتا ہے’میں آئی ڈی پی ہوں‘۔ باقی شناخت بعد میں بتائی جاتی ہے۔

Sunday, April 24, 2011

In (Pakistan's Political) Market - Radio Column by Wusatullah Khan (BBC Urdu) - اس بازار میں!

 بی بی سی اردو ڈاٹ کام :Courtesy

 وسعت اللہ خان

اس بازار میں!

حالانکہ حالات نے پاکستان کے زیریں طبقے کا بھرکس نکال دیا ہے اور مڈل کلاس لوئر کلاس کے درجے پر آگئی ہے لیکن سیاسی بازار خاصا گرم اور گہما گہمی سے بھرپور ہے۔

عمران خان کی چھابڑی میں ڈرون حملوں کے خلاف دھرنے کا آئٹم پڑا ہوا ہے، لیکن اس چھابڑی پر مکھی تک منڈلانے پر آمادہ نہیں۔
ق لیگ کے ٹھیلے پر پیپلز پارٹی سے مفاہمت کے جھنجنے برائے فروخت ہیں۔
آصف زرداری نے گرتی ہوئی سیاسی سیل بڑھانے اور گاہکوں کو متوجہ رکھنے کے لیے بھٹو کے ری ٹرائل کا آئٹم سٹال پر رکھ لیا ہے۔

Thursday, April 21, 2011

The musical chairs game forced on top bureaucrats - By Ansar Abbasi (The News)

The musical chairs game forced on top bureaucrats

ISLAMABAD: While the country is badly suffering because of poor policy-making, bad governance and mounting corruption, ad hocism rules the civil bureaucracy with Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani not letting even the federal secretaries to settle anywhere.

Whimsical postings and transfers in the civil bureaucracy are not letting even the top bureaucrats to concentrate on one area and make effective policies for the current challenges haunting Pakistan. As a consequence, the country has no sound policies but economic mess, water crisis, energy load shedding, gas shortage, worse law and order, poor personnel management etc.
A cursory look into the top-level changes, made by PM Gilani during his three years rule, shows the positions of federal secretaries having served as musical chairs for the senior-most officers in the civilian bureaucracy. Non-seriousness on the part of the top rulers is so serious that even the ministries and divisions like finance, petroleum, water and power, establishment and several others were not spared from this ongoing game of musical chairs.
A government servant is generally given a three-year term against a particular position, but during Gilani’s regime not even a single federal secretary has been allowed to complete his tenure.
The Finance Ministry which, during the PPP’s present rule, saw three political heads—Ishaq Dar, Shaukat Tareen and Dr Hafeez Shaikh—has been much worse for the finance secretaries. Gilani changed the finance secretaries at least five time, and most interestingly he tested the incumbent secretary finance twice against the same position.
Dr Waqar Masood Khan, the incumbent secretary finance, was holding the same position when Gilani took over as Prime Minister in March 2008. Within a couple of months, Gilani replaced Dr Waqar with Farrukh Qayum, but within a few months Qayum was again replaced by Dr Waqar. Later again within months, Dr Waqar was changed and replaced by Salman Siddiq, who was recently shifted to the FBR and replaced yet again by Dr Waqar Masood. The Finance Ministry is one of the most vital federal entities to frame economic policies and set the direction for the financial growth of the economy.
Much worse has been the situation in the case of the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Resources, which is squarely responsible to deal with the issues of petroleum products, CNG, LNG, LPG, Sui gas etc. and is required to envisage projects whereby Pakistan can be self-reliant in such energy resources. However, practically Pakistan’s resources are depleting, oil prices are rising, CNG and natural gas is in shortage, LPG is one-person specific whereas there is no timeframe for the import of LNG.
Under Gilani’s leadership, the important ministry like petroleum has become the most unpredictable for federal secretaries as at least seven of them were tested during the last three years. These secretaries have been Imtiaz Qazi, Kamran Lashari, Mehmood Salim Mehmood, G A Sabri, Zafar Mehmood, Farrukh Qayyum and Ahmad Waqar. The Petroleum Ministry is now waiting for the 8th secretary as Imtiaz Qazi’s marching order has already been issued.
The Water and Power Ministry, too, saw at least three federal secretaries, including Javed Akhter, Shahid Rafi and Ismail Qureshi, during the last three years. The Water and Power Ministry is the key to envisage and frame water and electricity policies. The country is deficient in both the water and the power sectors, but Gilani did not trust anyone. Interestingly, if not all the three, most of the secretaries, who led the Water and Power Ministry, did not have any experience and expertise of the area.
Prime Minister Gilani has even been uncertain with his own staff as he frequently changed all the key members of his bureaucratic team, including his principal secretary and secretaries of the Cabinet Division and the Establishment Division. Gilani started with Siraj Shamsuddin as his principal secretary and then tested Nargis Sethi and now is experiencing Khusnud Lashari.
The Establishment Division, which comes directly under the Prime Minister, also saw quite a few secretaries in the past three years. They include Abdul Rauf Chaudhry, Ismael Quershi, Ghiyasuddin Ahamd and Tariq Ali Bokhari.
The Cabinet Division, which is also under the prime minister, saw at least four federal secretaries, including Ghiasuddin, Nargis Sethi, Rauf chaudhry and Zafar Mehmood.
Another all important federal entity—the Ministry of Commerce—has been tested with four secretaries, including Zafar Mehmood, Qamar Zaman, additional secretary in charge, Salman Ghani and Asif shah.
The Economic Affairs Division has seen Abdul Wajid Rana, Sibtain Fazl Halim, Furrukh Qayyum and Akram Malik.
The Food and Agriculture Ministry saw Shafqat Nagmi, Junaid Iqbal Chaudhry, Ziaur Rehman and Ismael Quershi. This inconsistency in the Food Ministry led Pakistan to face the worst kind of food crisis, including phenomenal price-hike of food items.
In case of other ministries too, the situation has been disappointing as Prime Minister Gilani did not let any federal secretary to settle anywhere.
According to the details, the Education Ministry saw three secretaries, including Ather Ali khan, Abdul Rauf Chaudhry and Imtiaz Qazi; Environment Ministry had Kh M Naeem, Javed Malik and Kamran Lashari; Housing and Works witnessed Raja M Abbas, Ahmad Bukhsh Lehri, GM Sikender, Samiul haq Khilji and Rauf chaudhry; the Ministry of Information Technology was tested with Saeed Ahmad Khan, Rauf Chaudhry, Najeebullah Malik, Hafizur Rehman and Furrukh Qayyum; Information and Broadcasting Ministry witnessed Taimoor Azmat Usman, Mansoor Sohail, Ashfaq Gondal and Akram Shaheedi; Ministry of Kashmir Affairs saw Salman Siddque, Muhammad Ihtesham Khan and Javed Malik; Minorities is tested with Javed Akhtar, Inammullah Khan Toru, Abid Javed Akber and Abdul Ghaffar Somoro; Population Welfare Division saw Shehzado Sheikh, Nayyer Agha and Shaukat Hayat Durrani; Privatisation Commission has been tested with Muhammad Ijaz Chaudhry, Shahab Khawaja, Ahmad Jawad and Arif Mansoor; Youth Affairs saw Major Iqbal, Nazer Hussain Meher and Hifzur Rehman; Sports Ministry is tested with Aziz Ahmad Bilour (additional secretary in charge), Anisul Hasnain and M Ashraf Khan; Women Development Ministry witnessed Batool Iqbal Quershi, Saroat Lashari and Raja Raza Arshad; Ministry of Religious Affairs saw Shaukat Durrani, Agha Sewar Raza Qazilbash, Najeebullah Malik, AR Abid and Vakeel Khan; and the Railways Ministry is tested with Shahid Hussain Raja, Sami Khilji and Kashif Murtaza.
In certain cases, the abovementioned changes were necessitated by the retirement of officers, but in most of the cases the officers were transferred on the mere whims and wishes of the rulers.

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- Now Who can Believe that Pakistan's PM got NO Car وزیر اعظم کے پاس ذاتی گاڑی نہیں

بی بی سی اردو ڈاٹ کام :Courtesy

وزیر اعظم کے پاس ذاتی گاڑی نہیں

پاکستان کے الیکشن کمیشن کی جانب سے جاری کردہ ارکان پارلیمنٹ کے اثاثہ جات کے مطابق وزیر اعظم یوسف رضا گیلانی اور جمیعت علمائے اسلام (ف) کے رہنما مولانا فضل الرحمان کے پاس ذاتی گاڑی نہیں ہے۔

یہ تفصیل پاکستان کے الیکشن کمیشن کی جانب سے بدھ کو جاری کی گئی ارکان پارلیمنٹ کے اثاثوں کی تفصیلات سے ظاہر ہوئی ہے۔
تفصیلات کے مطابق وزیر اعظم کے کُل اثاثے کی مالیت ایک کروڑ 94 لاکھ روپے ہے۔ ان کے پاس 63 لاکھ روپے کا پنجاب کے شہر ملتان میں مکان ہے، ایک کروڑ تیس لاکھ روپے کا بینک بیلنس ہے۔ اس کے علاوہ وہ دو سو تولے سونے کے مالک بھی ہیں۔ تاہم ان کے پاس گاڑی نہیں ہے۔

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

What about the DMG? - By Mosharraf Zaidi (Daily The News)

In the haze of the 18th Amendment’s implementation, and the hullabaloo over the Higher Education Commission, some important things are entirely missing from the national discourse. Many advocates of a federal system of governance in Pakistan are propagating a post-18th Amendment scenario in which there will be lots of loose ends, and no one to tie them together. Others are arguing that
an absence of capacity in the provinces is reason enough to deny provinces the autonomy to decide the best course of action for their future.

We have good reason to be deeply suspicious of centralist arguments. Centralism has failed utterly, and comprehensively, to deliver anything to the people of Pakistan. But the answer to the problems created by the military’s obsession with centralised power is not provincialism and the linguistic and ethnic divisiveness it depends on. Cheap, convenient and politically flammable provincialism cannot solve Pakistan’s problem, any more than cheap jingoistic centralism can.

The founding fathers of Pakistan and the framers of Pakistan’s constitution knew better. They proposed a federal structure because federal governance has roots, not only in the Indian sub-continent’s long history of governing diverse populations, but also in early Muslim history.

The idea of federalism is simple, and flexible. At its basics, it is a form of government that allows separate sub-national units, like provinces, to come together under the umbrella of a central government. These constituent units then cede some functions and autonomy to the centre, and in response, are given guarantees by the centre.

A typical federal structure allows the highest level of policy and decision-making, like defense and foreign policy to be done by central governments, whilst retaining most aspects of governance that have a direct link with the people. Belonging to the federation frees the energy and resources of constituent units to focus on the things that really matter – like police, schools, roads and water.

Pakistan has rarely had the chance to be governed as a federation. There are two kinds of resources that governments value – financial and human. For Pakistan to be a true federation, it has to demonstrate that provinces control enough money and people to do their jobs and to do them well.

The seventh National Finance Commission (NFC), agreed in December 2009, and announced in 2010 goes some way to address the money part of the problem. Provinces have been ceding financial autonomy to the centre, have been providing the centre with revenue, and have watched the centre take more, and more, and more, every year.

In fact, until the rather revolutionary NFC award of 2010, the central government in Islamabad had slyly manipulated the federal share, from 20 percent of the divisible pool in 1974 to as high as 67.5 percent under the interim government for which Shahid Javed Burki was finance minister (in 1996). Notwithstanding the addition of new taxes in the divisible pool, the diminishing provincial share in the Pakistani state’s wealth is the most powerful proof of the military’s vigourous centralist appetite.

True federalists would be right to celebrate the seventh NFC award as a victory, but they need to be weary of how small this victory really is. The original 1:4 formula, with provinces allowing the centre 20 percent of national revenue, whilst they spend 80 percent, the federal character may serve as one benchmark. The logic for this would be that it would return Pakistan’s federal system to the vision of the framers of the constitution. Other formulae may work, but not without compelling logic that vests itself within the concept of federalism.

Of course, quarelling over money is not new or unique to Pakistan. It is also not rocket science. Even if Pakistan were to discover and implement the perfect fiscal autonomy for provinces, it would be an incomplete and flawed federation. The real prize for true federalists in Pakistan is not the scalp of the HEC, nor the Ministry of Health. The real prize is the All Pakistan Unified Grades. Figuring out how to fix Pakistan’s powerful, dysfunctional and super-entitled centralised civil service edifice is the holy grail of Pakistani federalism.

The All Pakistan Unified Grades, is the group of three federal civil service occupational groups – the DMG, the Police Service of Pakistan (PSP) and the Secretariat Group (SG) – that have a cross-country jurisdiction and mandate. In principle, there is nothing wrong with having an APUG, in fact, an APUG is indispensible for a good, functional federation.

However, a majority of civil servants that are members of the APUG – mostly the DMG and PSP, do not work for the federal government. They work for provincial governments. What is particularly important to remember about the APUG is that it is made up of officers only (that is those civil servants who belong to BSP 17 and above). These cohorts of senior officers of the government of Pakistan – from BPS 17 to BPS 22 – make and implement public policy every day.

Even more important is the share of jobs in the provincial governments that are reserved for the APUG. In 1992, an Inter-Provincial Cabinet Coordination Committee decision stipulated that there will be fixed percentages of posts for the APUG, by grade, in the provinces. What’s more, this reservation progressively increases the share of APUG civil servants, at the expense of provincial civil servants. At BPS 17, only 25 percent of provincial positions are reserved for APUG, but for BPS 18, BPS 19, BPS 20 and BPS 21, the shares are 40 percent, 50 percent, 60 percent and 65 percent respectively.

In this kind of a context, provinces can have all the autonomy they like. They can also take all of the money from the divisible pool that they like. But the men and women through whose steady hands provinces expect service delivery, essentially, are all federal resources. Their qibla can never be Karachi, Lahore, Quetta or Peshawar. Their qibla is the Establishment Division of the Federal Government.

So why has there be no discussion of the reform of the civil services? Because of all the interest groups, all the rent-seekers and all the charlatans this great country gives sanctuary and succour to, none have it as good as the elite senior civil servants of the PSP, the Secretariat Group and especially, the DMG. Good and honest civil servants suffer as badly as the citizens of this country, while smooth-talking charlatans enable their political bosses to suck the life out of Pakistan’s fiscal and administrative viability.

These senior officers, mostly BPS 21 and BPS 22 are the ones that occupy the boards of publically owned companies like PIA. They are the ones who prevent reform, and reformation within Pakistan’s cancerous public administrative system. Most importantly, they have been the enablers of military interventions from the very first one this nation was cursed with. No serious discussion of a truly federal future for Pakistan can be conducted in the absence of a discussion of how Pakistan’s civil services will be reformed to tackle post 18th-Amendment public policy challenges.

The writer advises governments, donors and NGOs on public policy. www.mosharrafzaidi.com

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Wednesday, April 13, 2011

Mass Migration from Tirah, Bara - 13 April 2011

 تیراہ، باڑہ سے بڑے پیمانے پر نقل مکانی
صوبہ خیبر پختونخواہ میں نوشہرہ کے قریب قائم جلوزئی کیمپ سے باجوڑ اور مہمند ایجنسی کے متاثرین کی واپسی کا سلسلہ شروع ہو گیا ہے۔
تاہم باجوڑ اور مہمند ایجنسی کے بیشتر متاثرین کا کہنا ہے کہ وہ واپس اپنے علاقوں کو نہیں جانا چاہتے۔
دوسری جانب خیبر ایجنسی کے علاقے تیراہ اور باڑہ سے بڑی تعداد میں لوگ کیمپ میں پہنچ رہے ہیں۔

Has Pakistan Recognised the Emirate of Waziristan? - By Farrukh Saleem (The News)

Courtesy: Daily "The News", 13 April 2011.
Farrukh Saleem 


ISLAMABAD: Syed Ahmad Sultan Sakhi Sarwar, the Lakh Data, Sakhi Sultan, Lalan Wali Sarkar was bombed 10 days ago. In July, Abul Hassan Ali Hajvery, Datta Ganj Bakhsh’s darbar was attacked. In the recent past, Baba Fariduddin Ganjshakar, Barri Imam, Malang Baba, Abdullah Shah Ghazi, Abu Saeed Baba, Rehman Baba, Bahadar Baba and Mian Omar Baba have all come under attack.


Terror as their principal tool, there has been a conscious, deliberate strategy to exploit pre-existing fissures within the Pakistani society; Deobandi vs Barelvi, for instance.

In calendar 2010, fatalities in terrorist violence numbered 7,435 Pakistanis while the total from 2003 to 2010 stands at 32,623 Pakistanis killed. In calendar 2010, there were 49 suicide attacks and 473 bomb blasts between Khyber and Karachi. The master perpetrators are on a killing spree bent upon sending out three messages: First, the State of Pakistan cannot protect its citizens. Second, chaos and anarchy rules. Third, de-legitimisation of the state.

Salman Taseer, the 26th governor of Punjab, was gunned down in Islamabad exactly 3.1 kilometres from the President House. Three messages: First, the state of Pakistan cannot protect its own governor. Second, chaos and anarchy rules. Third, de-legitimisation of the state.

Shahbaz Bhatti, the Federal Minister for Minorities, was assassinated in Islamabad exactly 16.5 kilometres from the Prime Minister’s Secretariat. Three messages: First, the state of Pakistan cannot protect its own governor. Second, chaos and anarchy rules. Third, de-legitimisation of the state.

On February 15, 1989, the last Soviet soldier walked out of Afghanistan and out of that chaos and anarchy was born the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan. Kandahar, which served as the emirate’s capital from 1996 to 2001, was less than 40 miles from the Pakistani border. In 1995, Pakistan experienced its first suicide attack that killed 14 in Islamabad. By 1998, the state of Pakistan had lost writ over large chunks of North Waziristan Agency. By 2000, more than 20,000 sq km of Pakistani terrain had been lost to forces that thrive in chaos and anarchy.

In 2000, Pakistan went through at least 14 bomb blasts including two each in Karachi and Lahore plus one each in Islamabad, Sialkot and Hyderabad. Between February 4, 2001 and September 6, 2001, there were a total of 45 bomb blasts in each and every major Pakistani city. Imagine; September 11 hadn’t happened.

Clearly, a three-pronged military strategy — bomb blasts, suicide attacks and targeted killings — has been in place even prior to September 11 (the intensity surely picked up pace after the arrival of American forces in the region). There has indeed been a conscious, deliberate and a premeditated military strategy at work — a strategy designed to create chaos and anarchy with the intent of de-legitimising the state of Pakistan in the eyes of its own citizens.

To be certain, the above military strategy has pure political objectives — to build a new political order on the ruins of the de-legitimised state. The military strategy has actually had some successes. In February 2006, for instance, the establishment of the Islamic Emirate of Waziristan was announced. On September 5, 2006, the state of Pakistan signed a peace accord with the emirate thus affixing its stamp of recognition.

To be sure, the forces longing to de-legitimise the state of Pakistan cannot withstand the coercive apparatus of the state in a conventional face-off and thus an asymmetric strategy of bomb blasts, suicide attacks and targeted killings is being pursued. This is psychological terrorist warfare at its best trying to create an environment where normal state of governance cannot continue. The real intent is to overwhelm the state of Pakistan in order to bring her down to her knees. It’s all about three things: power, power and more power. Nothing to do with religion, my Lord.

Wasn’t it Polonius, King Claudius’s chief counsellor, who said, “Though this be madness, yet there is method in’t?”

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Sunday, April 10, 2011

Supreme Court's decision on Haj Scandal

Courtesy: Daily "The News". Follow the link.


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Major Scandal in Benazir Income Support Programme


Courtesy: "Daily The News"
Ansar Abbasi
Sunday, April 10, 2011
ISLAMABAD: The Benazir Income Support Programme (BISP) has been hit by a unique scandal where one of its top executives has alleged that 100 “forged” appointment letters of assistant directors, complaint assistants and others were issued to favourite candidates.


The BISP chairperson, however, has refuted the allegations and has blamed the officer of having been involved in cases of sexual harassment.

These appointments are reportedly the same about which President Asif Ali Zardari was briefed by BISP chief Farzana Raja at Naudero on April 4. The president, however, did not know that these appointment letters, already issued to the candidates concerned, had become controversial as the officer concerned had refused to own them.

Farzana Raja told The News that the signature on the letters were not forged but were “twisted”, and she had already referred them to forensic experts. The officer concerned, Sindh BISP Director General Akbar Aleem Shamim, on April 6 wrote to his director, secretary/managing director of the BISP in Islamabad and other concerned and insisted that he had not signed what he called the “bogus offer letters”.

Official documents show Shamim termed it a criminal conspiracy and warned the concerned director headquarter, Sindh, Pervaiz Iqbal, of proceeding against him under criminal law.

But the BISP head office in Islamabad, instead of inquiring into the matter, issued an office order on April 8 asking the officer to immediately leave the office.

According to Farzana, the Establishment Division has been approached to initiate an inquiry against the officer on charges of sexual harassment.

Farzana said that the officer was transferred and posted to Karachi from Punjab only a month back after he was accused of sexual harassment there. When probed she said that an inquiry was held, but the officer was forgiven by her secretary in consultation with her (Farzana).

Farzana also confirmed that despite the inquiry of sexual harassment of one of his female employees, she and her secretary gave “outstanding” ACR to the officer and posted him to Karachi.

Shamim, when contacted to explain his position vis a vis BISP chief’s allegations of sexual harassment, said that he knew that he would be dragged in all sorts of scandals after he had refused to own the appointments, which he insisted were made in violation of merit and without any formal approval.

The appointment process, he said, was never completed and even the score sheets of written tests of candidates were not finalized but despite all this the appointment letters were issued to 100 candidates.

About the allegations of sexual harassment, he said the BISP chairperson was trying to harass him and explained that the case of sexual harassment during his stint in Punjab was baseless and was cooked up by the employee whose contract was terminated by him on the recommendation of his director. He asked that if he was not of good character than why did the BISP chairperson appoint him as the head of BISP in Sindh besides judging him as “outstanding” in his ACR.

Farzana Raja, however, admitted that it was a mistake on her part to give an “outstanding” ranking to the officer. She also lamented that she, on the advice of her secretary, forgave the officer in the sexual harassment case of Punjab but urged that there has been no irregularity in the recent appointment of 100 BISP officials in Sindh.

She said that there has been no violation of merit and that the process of recruitment was followed in line with the procedure and in a transparent manner.

Farzana Raja said that her office had also received complaints of sexual harassment against Shamim even from Karachi. She did not have much to say when asked why a sexual harasser was removed from Karachi, given an outstanding report and then made in charge of the BISP, Sindh. She, however, said that the officer had objected to the Sindh appointments only after he got the hint that he was being proceeded against.

She referred to an April 4 explanation sought by her secretary from Shamim. In the said explanation letter, the officer was asked to explain three points: (i) Leaving the station and place of duty at Naudero prematurely and without permission while the president of Pakistan and chairperson were themselves at the venue, discussing issues pertaining to BISP; (ii) making insufficient logistic arrangements for the stay of the chairperson; and (iii) repeated negligent and irresponsible behaviour especially in the wake of an inquiry being already held against him while posted as DG (Punjab).

According to a Sindh BISP source, the chairperson got upset with her DG, Sindh, Shamim, after the latter could not provide official vehicles to Farzana’s husband to his satisfaction in the same tour of Karachi and Naudero.

To the above three points, Shamim gave a written response to the BISP secretary and narrated the complete tale of his engagement in Naudero to conclude that no breach of discipline or decorum was committed by him. On the second point, he said that the all logistic arrangement made for the chairperson were in place. He says, in his response, that he had even asked the chairperson that if her stay was comfortable to which she had replied in affirmative.

Regarding the Punjab probe, he wrote that to the best of his knowledge no inquiry was pending with the BISP, Islamabad, except for what he called “ill-motivated” probe, launched against him and conducted by a junior officer on contract in the matter of his termination of two undesirable complaint assistants. He reminded the secretary that in his meeting with the chairperson in the secretary’s presence in Oct 2010 his services as DG, Punjab, were lauded, and he was given an outstanding ACR for the year ending December 2010.

On April 6 Shamim wrote to his Director HQ, Sindh, and also marked the copies of the same letter to the BISP secretary and other concerned in Islamabad, to highlight the issue of bogus offer letters to 100 appointees in Sindh. The letter, whose subject was “Explanation—issuance of Bogus Offer Letters of 25 Assistant Directors, 25 Assistant Complaints, 25 Naib Qasids and 25 Chowkidars”, also contained the list of all those appointed through the alleged bogus offer letters.

He conveyed through the same letter that he had come to the knowledge that these appointments were made in his name and bearing purportedly his signatures, which he wholly disowned.

He said that as the issue was being dealt by Director Pervaiz Iqbal, so he was constrained to believe that the forged offer letters were issued by Iqbal, which amounts to criminal conspiracy.

In the same letter, he added, “I am fully aware that the Selection Committee under the chairmanship of Dr Muhammad Sarwar Khan, Director General (Administration), has yet to finalize the selection and put up the formal minutes after signatures of all concerned, to the worthy secretary, BISP, and chairperson, BISP, for their formal approval.”

Believing that the recruitment process has not yet completed, he asked his director HQ Pervaiz Iqbal to explain in writing his position as to who had signed the 100 call letters on his behalf. He also wrote: “I have further been informed through reliable source that you are calling the directors to Karachi without my permission and obtaining their signatures on the minutes of meeting as it happened on 05.04.2011 in my absence. And further to seek your explanation as to why not criminal charges be pressed against you in this regard, your reply is desired immediately so as to reach the undersigned by 07.04.2011 positively.”

Instead of getting a response to the explanation, Shamim had sought, he got an office order from BISP, Islamabad headquarters, under the signature of Director HR Ms Farhana Bashir, conveying to him: “With the approval of the competent authority, it has been decided that Akbar Aleem Shamim shall cease to hold the office of director general (Inspection and Training) as well as the additional charge of director general, Sindh, with immediate effect.”

Without any wastage of time, the Establishment Division has also been approached to issue a charge sheet against the officer on the basis of statements, which the BISP has promised to provide to the ED sooner than later.
With Regards,
"FATA Awareness Initiative" Team.

Friday, April 8, 2011

D.G Khan Suicide Bomber's Revelations - 300 SBs in Pipeline

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Thursday, April 7, 2011

Who is Poisoning these Minds?

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