PTI govt begins identifying retired employees for pension payments

Will pay on pensioner ID cards, seeks to end payments to fake claimants

ISLAMABAD: The federal government has begun the process of identifying all retired federal government employees to track pensioners. It has sent Pensioners' Identity Card forms and proformas, prepared by the Accountant General Pakistan Revenue (AGPR), to all ministries and divisions in order to identify their retired employees.

After scrutiny and verification of data by the respective ministries and divisions, the widows and heirs of deceased government employees will be issued pensioners’ identity cards.

According to sources, the proformas will be given by the ministries and divisions to their respective retired employees or, in case of deceased employees, to their heirs. The proformas and pensioners' ID card forms must then be filled out correctly and submitted to the relevant accounts office following which they will be issued pensioner identity cards. All concerned ministries and divisions have been further directed to publish the pensioners' identity card forms on their official websites so that they can be downloaded from there, sources said, adding that the issuance of identity cards will help detect fake and ghost pensioners so that they could be eliminated.

Subsequently, the payment of pensions will be made only to holders of pensioner identity cards. The form requires pertinent information along with an attested passport size photograph of retired employees or their heirs. The information fields to be filled out include the employee’s name and division, department, ministry, personal number, father's name, post on retirement, basic pay scale, Computerized National Identity Card Number (CNIC), date of birth as per service book, date of appointment to the office and date of retirement from employment and, in case of deceased employees, their date of death.

Additional information is to be provided in cases of family pensions, including family pensioner's name, marital status, relationship to the deceased civil servant, the computerized national identity card number of the family pensioner, ID, blood group, postal address, permanent address and email. The family pensioner will also have to get the pensioner identity card form attested by a gazetted officer who must enter their name, signature, title, and CNIC and contact numbers.

Similarly, in the accounts office where the form is submitted, the name and signature of the person making the entry must be filled in before the form is checked.