Expensive living

This is to draw the attention of the concerned authorities to the problems being faced by government employees of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Most of these employees, who are serving in Peshawar, hail from different parts of the province and have to move to the capital city from far-flung areas, often with their families. Unfortunately, the accommodation provided by the government to the employees is insufficient. Due to lack of government housing colonies, many employees have to rent a house for accommodation. This creates an extra burden on their already limited budget since their salary is already meagre. The housing allowance given to the employees is based on the pay scale of the year 2008. The allowance is not indexed with inflation and the employees have been receiving the same even since 2008.
The rent of an ordinary one- or two-bedroom house in the centre of the city is even higher than the full pay of a poor civil employee. The anxiety of dominant expenditures on housing and utility bills leads to the poor performance of an employee. Also it has been observed that on various occasions recruitment is not carried out on merit and deserving applicants who do not have any reference are left waiting for decades. The government must think about the betterment of its workers and must either construct new housing colonies, or, increase the allowance in accordance with the current time to ease the problems of its workforce.
Adeel Ahmad Sattar (Peshawar)