Citizens' Complaints: FIA sets deadlines for investigations and inquiries

The decision was taken after several citizens had approached the FIA director and complained about delayed inquiries.

LAHORE:

The Federal Investigation Agency’s (FIA) Punjab director has issued new Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) to all circle heads along with inquiry and investigation officers that all inquiries must be disposed of within three months. The new SOP states that investigation of cases should be completed in six months.

Sources told The Express Tribune that the decision was taken after several citizens had approached the FIA director and complained that their inquiries had been pending for several months. Sources in the FIA said that some of the inquiries are in the verification stage for two to three months.

Investigation of cases, they said, sometimes takes more than a year.

On the direction of FIA Punjab Director Waqar Haider, the Monitoring and Inspection cell has sought details of all inquiries pending for over three months and cases pending for six months.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 28^th, 2011.