Daily Times

LAHORE: Office of Ombudsman Punjab, established to extend justice and relief to the public and called “poor man’s court”, has failed to provide justice and relief to the employees, working under its own command, and a number of feeding cadre employees of the Ombudsman Punjab have approached Lahore High Court for relief.

Lahore High Court’s Justice Muhammad Sajid Mahmood Sethi while accepting the request of employees directed Ombudsman Punjab not to disturb the employees till further orders.

According to details, Najam Saeed, a retired bureaucrat, after assuming the charge of Ombudsman Punjab, illegally transferred as many as 25 officials from grade 01 to grade 18 to remote districts. Majority of transferred staff was recruited on contract and on need-based policy which included a computer programmer (BS-18), a protocol officer (BS-17), a public relations officer (BS-17), three assistants (BS-16), a personal assistant (BS-16), a library assistant (BS-11), four stenographers (BS-14), four junior clerks (BS-11), a dispatch rider (BS-05), five naib qasids (BS-02) and three security guards (BS-01).

Since the employees were recruited on contracts and need-based policy, the transfer of such employees from Lahore to remote districts like Rajanpur, DG Khan, Bhakkar, Chakwal and Layyah districts without any justification did not follow the rules. All employees were transferred in district offices of Ombudsman knowingly that all such district offices were still working without proper sanction and approval of the government and establishment of the same was also already questioned by the provincial government.

Moreover, the transfers were made against posts which did not exist, also an illegal act on the part of Ombudsman Punjab, that’s why all transferred employees while working in remote districts were drawing their salaries from Lahore since July 2017. No one except Ombudsman Punjab Najam Saeed, can know and imagine the utility of a computer operator (BS-18) in Rajanpur, a public relations officer to the Ombudsman Punjab (BS-17) in Vehari, a protocol officer to the Ombudsman Punjab (BS-17) in Bhakkar and the other transferred staff, it was said.

The employees of Ombudsman Punjab Office protested against illegal transfers and acts of nepotism on the part of Ombudsman Punjab as Samiullah, reportedly the nephew of Ombudsman Punjab, was recruited as advisor (BS-19) and was given the charge of finance and HR in the office. Owing to the unjust acts of the Ombudsman Punjab, some of the contractual employees approached Lahore High Court for redressal of their grievances and requested to regularise their jobs.

Justice Muhammad Sajid Mahmood Sethi, in his order on November 29, accepted the request of the employees and directed Ombudsman Punjab not to disturb Computer Programmer Najam us Saqib, Protocol Officer Ehsan Ghani, Assistant Tanseer Abid and Junior Clerk Adil Hussain.

Despite following the orders of Lahore High Court, Ombudsman Punjab refused to renew the contracts of aforementioned employees which expired on November 30, 2017.

Published in Daily Times, December 7^th 2017.