Foreign tours: Little to show for plentiful trips abroad

Nearly Rs50 million spent in three years on official trips of Ministry of Science and Technology officials

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s contributions in towards the different fields of sciences may be dismal, but large sums to the tune of around Rs49 million were spent on official tours abroad by officials from the Ministry of Science and Technology (MoST) and a few of its attached departments.

During the last three years, 506 officers of the ministry and its attached departments, subordinate offices and autonomous corporations were sent abroad on official visits, stated a written reply submitted by the ministry in the last Senate session.

Senator Muhammad Talha Mahmood had asked the ministry to state the names and designations of officials sent abroad on official visits during the last three years, along with the names of countries visited, purpose and duration of the visit, and expenditure incurred in each case.

In response to the question, interesting revelations surfaced which include that a total of around Rs48.81 million was spent on around 300 visits. Of note is the fact that this expenditure only includes travel and daily allowances, and not airfare.



COMSATS Institute of Information Technology (CIIT) got the lion’s share – Rs42 million – for 270 visits abroad.

The CIIT is a multi-campus public research university in Pakistan with its main campus located in Islamabad.

The 11 MoST officials who went on 10 trips abroad ran up expenditure amounting up to Rs3.3 million, the written reply maintained.

A total of Rs2.2 million was spent on 11 visits abroad by the Pakistan Science Foundation (PSF) officials.

An expenditure of Rs600,000 was incurred on eight official trips for the Pakistan Standards and Quality Control Authority (PSQCA) officials. All of these trips were part-funded by donor bodies. An expenditure of Rs200,000 was incurred on two official trips for the officials of the Pakistan National Accreditation Council (PNAC).



In addition, no officers from the Pakistan Engineering Council (PEC), the Council for Works and Housing Research (CWHR) and the STEDEC Technology Commercialisation Corporation of Pakistan have been sent abroad on official visits during the past three years, stated the written reply.

Other than the 300 visits for which expenses were borne fully or partially by the national exchequer, there were a number of fully-sponsored foreign tours as well.

The expenditure on allowances for MoST Secretary Kamran Ali Qureshi was Rs266,787. He attended the 18th annual session of the UNC on Science and Technology for Development (UNCSTD) in Switzerland in May 2015.

Talal Chaudhry, the parliamentary secretary for MoST, paid a visit to London for the Westminster Symposium in July 2016 and received Rs193,931 in allowances. Chaudhry also went to Turkey and received Rs311,756 as his allowances.



Interestingly, PSF Chairman Dr Muhammad Ashraf made as many as 10 trips abroad in the past three years. He went to Turkey, China, Iran, the UK, Sri Lanka, and France. All but three of these official trips were sponsored by other bodies.

The biggest bill was Rs1,137,462 for a delegation from CIIT led by Dr Arshad S Malik. They had gone to Lancaster University, among others, in 2016 to seek academic collaborations.

Just Rs40,000 was spent on an official visit to Germany by Dr Arshad Saleem Bhatti of the CIIT in October 2016. Another small tab was Rs35,000 for a visit to Turkey by CIIT Associate Professor Sannah Ejaz in the same month.

Among the cases where ticket costs were borne by the government was one undertaken by PNAC DG Ismat Gul Khattak to Jeddah and Dubai. She received allowances of Rs71,020, along with Rs71,500 for airfare from the national exchequer.