Making room for PMS officers

LAHORE: The provincial administration has decided to repatriate officers, belonging to federal cadres other than the District Management Group (DMG) and deputed in the Punjab, to accommodate officers of the Provincial Management Service (PMS), it is learnt.

The provincial administration, which is dominated by DMG officers, is likely to repatriate 15 officers in the coming week with the ‘excuse’ that they do not have any posting quota in the administrative hierarchy.

According to officials, the Services and General Administration Department (S&GAD) has prepared a list of 15 officers who belong to the Office Management Group (OMG), Postal, Audit and Accounts (A&A), Railways, Information, Income Tax, Custom and Excise, Commerce and Trade to be repatriated in thecoming week.

“The DMG is doing this to ensure that the PMS officers do not demand high level postings, which are currently being occupied by DMG officers” a senior PMS officer opined.

The officer, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that such repatriation was not part of the 12 demands made by PMS officers from a committee headed by the law minister, Rana Sanaullah, to redress the grievances of PMS officers.

The association, he said, had demanded its rightful share in transfers, training, accommodation and membership, which it alleged is dominated by DMG officers in the province. The main demand had been the revision of Inter Provincial Coordination Committee formula of 1993. The PMS had declared it illegal and unconstitutional as it had neither been notified and nor was part of the rules. The DMG officers have been working in the provincial administrative hierarchy under this formula.

A federal service official, likely to be repatriated this week, said that the DMG was being unfair to officers of other federal cadres “to make sure that its own staff members – posted at key positions in the provincial hieracrchy – do not get posted out of the province.”

“The PMS had demanded a share in postings in the Punjab held by the DMG officers; now officers of other federal cadres are being made the scapegoat,” he added.

Rai Manzoor Nasir, the president of the PMS Association, said the association had never demanded the repatriation of officers from other federal cadres. “The association had demanded its rightful share in postings from the DMG that has hijacked the civil administration and its key slots. If these officers are indispensable for the provincial hierarchy, the DMG should accommodate them against its quota. The PMS Association will not object to their being posted in the Punjab,” he added.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 31^st, 2010.