Two MNAs included in CSB for promotion of officials to BS-20

ISLAMABAD: To influence the bureaucracy, the government has included two members of the National Assembly belonging to the PPP as key members in the Central Selection Board (CSB) for the promotion of officers of the Police Service of Pakistan (PSP), the District Management Group (DMG) and the Secretariat Group Officers from BS-19 to BS-20, sources told The News.

Meanwhile, the Establishment Division postponed for unknown reasons the meeting of the Central Selection Board (CSB) to be held today, June 27, under the chairmanship of the chairman Federal Public Service Commission (FPSC).

The selected MNAs are Pir Aftab Hussain Shah Jilani (NA-226 Mirpurkhas, Sindh) and Ghulam Farid Kathia (NA-161-Sahiwal-II, Punjab). Old bureaucrats term the inclusion of the MNAs as members of the CSB a novel idea of the present federal government which will politicise the process of promotions by the CSB and begin an era of “spoils-system” in the civil services.

Previously, the CSB was always been manned by the senior-most civil servants and police officers and its recommendations were based on primarily the “blood-count” based on the Performance Evaluation Reports (PERs) of officers. Many have raised their fingers at the postponement of the CSB, which has not been held to promote the police officers since August 2006. Many PSP officers feel stranded in BS-19 over the last many years although they have completed the mandatory period of 17 years of service required for promotion to the BS-20 under the Civil Servants Act and enshrined in the Esta Code, the holy book for the civil services structure, career and promotion matters.

The CSB is usually headed by Chairman Federal Public Service Commission (FPSC) and its members include all the four provincial chief secretaries, provincial home secretaries, all the four provincial police chiefs, secretary finance, and some other senior civil servants.

The inclusion of MNAs of PPP, Aftab Shah Jilani from Sindh and and Ghulam Fareed Kathia from District Sahiwal, Punjab, has only recently been done and will open a new chapter in the history of civil services.

The senior police officers term the promotion blockade as serious, demoralising and artificially created by the Establishment Division. The PSP cadre has not been revised in the Establishment Code since 1988 whereas there is no ‘cadre limitation’ for the DMG officers.

These PSP officers belonging to the 14th CTP have not yet been promoted as DIGs in BS-20, although their counterparts of the DMG belonging to even the 16th CTP have already been promoted to BS-20. Now officers of 17th, 18th, and 19th CTP will be considered for promotion to BS-20. The situation and discrepancy in the BS-19 is even more glaring as DMG officers belonging to even the 28th CTP, with only 7 years and 5 months of total service, have been promoted to BS-19 in the Departmental Selection Committee (DSC) held on 25th June.

The police officers whose promotions have been blocked by the Establishment Division have now openly demanded that their administrative control may be transferred to the Interior Division as they do not expect justice from the Establishment Division since it is heavily occupied by bureaucrats belonging to the DMG, who do not want to promote police officers due to professional jealousy.

Shahid Hayat and later Dr Shoaib Suddle had moved the courts for giving them extra service after the age of superannuation since they could not perform their service due to imprisonment and being OSDs, respectively, after the killing of the Murtaza Bhutto in a police encounter in Karachi. Another co-accused Rai Tahir was also imprisoned for about three years and he also qualifies for extra service after retirement.