PHOTO: IHC WEBSITE
Finance, and defence secretaries in connection with a notification declaring that teachers at federal government institutes were not entitled to monetisation allowance.
IHC judge Justice Mohsin Akhtar Kayani issued notices to the respondents for April 19 while taking up of petition filed by 15 federal government and garrison directorate teachers serving in grade 20 at different educational institutes.
The petitioners, through their counsel Haseeb Shakoor Paracha, told the court that professors and principals working at different educational institutions under the Federal Directorate of Education (FDE) have been denied the transport monetisation facility which was given to officials in other public departments.
Paracha said that the petitioners have been availing the facility since January 2012, but a steering committee ordered on January 29, 2016 that professors and teachers were not entitled to the allowance.
The committee had decided that “conveyance allowance at a rate of Rs5,000 per month shall continue to be admissible as determined by the finance division”. The amount is lower than that for officials of equal seniority in other departments.
The counsel said that the order was “discriminatory” as the petitioners were not being treated equally. “The same order extends the facility of allowance to doctors working under the federal government,” he said.
He has prayed the court to declare the steering committee order regarding withdrawal of the allowance illegal, unlawful and without merit.
Under the monetisation policy, all BS-20 officers were granted transport monetisation allowance of Rs65,960 per month instead of monthly conveyance allowance.
The basic objective of the policy was austerity and to eliminate any misuse of official vehicles.
Published in The Express Tribune, March 31st, 2016.
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