Out-of-turn allotments: Plots for more than 2,200 ‘blue eyed’ employees

Official document indicates only 67 allotments were based on ‘merit’.

ISLAMABAD:

Residential plots have been allotted to 2,254 ‘blue-eyed’ government employees during the last three years, while around 180,000 deserving employees of the federal capital wait on even after more than 40 years.

The Ministry of Housing and Works allotted these residential units to district court judges, top bureaucrats of the Supreme Court, the Prime Minister Secretariat (PMS), President Secretariat (PS), Intelligence Bureau (IB) and all the federal ministries, along with a long list of other officials in various departments of the regime.

A document available with The Express Tribune indicates that only 67 of the allotments were based on merit – those who had made earlier petitions and deserved the units. As many as 308 employees got allotments while working for non-entitled departments.

Shahbir Ahmed, a former federal government employee, said he submitted his application to the estate office in 1974, but did not get a plot till his superannuation four years ago.

Applications of two employees of the Federal Directorate of Education Asif Shujja Khan and Arshad Hussain were pending since 1977 and 1974, respectively, estate officer Mohammad Asim said. He, however, did not comment on the out-of-turn allotments. He said only 18,545 residential units were available for over 0.6 million employees.

The housing and works minister had informed the Parliament last year that the government planned to build 50,000 residential units in new developing areas to overcome a shortage of around 65,000 houses.

When contacted, recently appointed Housing and Works Secretary Kamran Lashari said out-of-turn allotments was not the real problem. He said an acute shortage of residential units in Islamabad was the real reason for a lax in rules for officials. He added that the ministry was trying its best to allot plots on merit.

Parliamentary Secretary MNA Muzafar-ul-Mulk raised serious concerns over the housing ministry’s actions, “I spoke to the housing minister Faisal Saleh Hayat, but he did not look into the issue. The Supreme Court should take notice of these out-of-turn allotments.”

The document includes a list of the names of officials who were allotted plots out-of-turn. These are from federal ministries, the police, other law enforcement agencies and bureaucratic departments. Designations of some, though, have changed in the past few years.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 20^th, 2012.