Names of some govt officials who benefitted from BISP unearthed

There are 93 officials from the Income Tax Department of grade-1 to grade-16 registered in BISP


​ Our Correspondent January 30, 2020
Benazir Income Support Programme (BISP) PHOTO: PID

ISLAMABAD: Names of 19 government officials of grade-17 to grade-22, who were among the beneficiaries of the Benazir Income Support Programme (BISP), had been made public, Express News reported on Thursday.

Among the beneficiaries are Justice Mian Arif (grade-22), Muhammad Shiraz and Muhammad Saleem (grade- 19) from the Education Department.

Government officials, whose spouses were receiving money under BISP are named as Muhammad Afzal (grade- 18) from Education Department, Qazi Kabir Ahmed (grade- 18) from Department of Public Health, Hukum Dada (grade-17) from Education Department, Mohammad Muskin (grade-17) of the Auditor General of the Department, Muhammad Yusuf and Riaz Ahmed Khan (grade-17) of Higher Education Department.

Govt officers availing BISP won’t be named

There are 93 officials from the Income Tax Department of grade-1 to grade-16 registered in BISP.

Grade-16 officers include Abdul Sattar, Ghulam Sarwar, Haji Zaheer Ali and Jafar Hussain whereas grade-14 include Khuda Buksh, Bakhtiar Ali and Abdul Hameed.

Earlier on Wednesday Special Assistant to the PM on Accountability Shahzad Akbar said that the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) would probe 2,000 officers for availing BISP.

“These officers or their spouses had applied for the BISP grant and were withdrawing money through the biometric system,” said PM’s aide at a news conference.

The PM’s aide explained that the government had written to the chief secretaries and the Establishment Division seeking departmental action against these officers and recovering money from them.

However, he added, as the money the officers had withdrawn was from the federal budget, the cases have also been referred to the FIA.

Earlier this month, Special Assistant to the PM on Social Protection and Poverty Alleviation Dr Sania Nishtar had said the BISP officers who were among the list of beneficiaries had been issued notices while the names of federal and provincial government officers who were benefitting from the programme have been shared with the authorities concerned.

In December 2019, Dr Nishtar had announced that the government had conducted forensic data analysis and identified 820,165 undeserving people who were availing BISP assistance.

Action to be taken against govt employees benefitting from BISP

According to official data, the highest number of government officials receiving BISP assistance was from Sindh. As many as 1,122 officers of grade 17 and above from the province were BISP beneficiaries.

The second-highest number came from Balochistan where 741 government officials had signed up for the poverty alleviation scheme. From Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, 403 government officials availed the BISP funds, while 137 were from Punjab.

From the federal government, 62 officers received the programme funds. Additionally, one officer of the Pakistan Railways, 22 of Azad Jammu and Kashmir, and 49 of Gilgit Baltistan were also marked as undeserving recipients of the BISP assistance.

COMMENTS

Replying to X

Comments are moderated and generally will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive.

For more information, please see our Comments FAQ