Punjab Land Record Authority: LROs go without salaries for three months

Officers say they are being humiliated and want to quit jobs

LAHORE: Land Record Officers (BS-16), selected through competitive exams for Land Record Centres across Punjab, have been working without salaries for the last three months and are merely functioning as supporting staff.

“Experiencing such humiliation, some of us are weighing our options to leave this job. We are officers and not hired to work like dispatch riders or as assistants to Punjab Land Record Authority (PLRA) officers,” an LRO told The Express Tribune, requesting anonymity.

“We were happy being selected by the Punjab Public Service Commission (PPSC), but the attitude of PLRA officers and nonpayment of salaries has lowered morale,” he remarked.



The PPSC had advertised 161 posts of LROs on a three-year contract basis for the Board of Revenue (BoR) Punjab in September 2016. The PPSC had announced the names of 136 successful candidates.  Of these, more than 44 have left their jobs, blaming the discriminatory attitude of PLRA for their resignations. The remaining LROs are now also on the cusp of leaving.



As many as 25 LROs have challenged their posting at the PLRA before the Lahore High Court as they have reservations their seniority.

They were hired by BoR, but later put at the disposal of the newly-established PLRA, the officer said. The LRO stated that he and his peers completed a one-month course with the Management and Professional Development Department.

After completing the training, the first group was sent to different land record centres in the province on a one-month attachment to assistant directors. This arrangement ended on March 4.

During the training, each LRO was supposed to spend at least a month at one station. Attachment of the second group of LROs started on April 24. Later, the attachment plan was changed and most of the LROs spent just a week at one centre and their continued for seven weeks.



The officers going on attachment termed this arrangement as a cause of concern. They said the “blue eyed boys” would complete their attachment at just two centres and the rest needed to do the same for seven weeks at as many different centres.

“It will not be easy for us to arrange residence in just seven days at a new place and that too without salaries being paid,” one LROs remarked.

Meanwhile, MPA Rana Babar Hussain, who is the head of the PLRA member board, told The Express Tribune that no one could deny the right of salary to the LROs. “They will be paid salaries from the day they were inducted into the PLRA,” he said. “Some formalities take time and that was the reason for the delay in payment of salaries.”

He said there was a shortage of staff at record centres and they were hiring service centre officials and LROs.

MPA Tahia Noon, who is a member of PLRA boad, said out of 136 selected officers, 40 declined the offer to join and two went back to their previous service. “Therefore, the notion they left the job because of the attitude of PLRA staff is baseless.”

She said LROs were not being posted at far flung centres because they have to go through a 14-week training before the first posting. She said the policy was being implemented across the board and there was no exception.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 3^rd, 2017.