Daily Times

Pakistan Citizen Portal (PCP) was launched on 28 October 2018 by the Prime Minister (PM) of Pakistan Imran Khan with an aim to timely address the problems of the people. PM Khan called it one of the manifestations of ‘New Pakistan’. An app is available on Google play store on android mobiles where people can register and post their complaints against government offices and employees. Apparently, it’s a good step taken by PM Khan, but the PCP structure, registration, database and application procedure are littered with many technical legal flaws in itself. Most Pakistani applicants are misusing PSP to defame public servants and even anonymous applications with fake and false complaints are being submitted through this app against public servants. Welcome to the new Pakistan of Khan where justice has become so cheap and instant that it is now available on Google play store even.

Now in Pakistan, if anybody wants to scandalize any public servant, just submit an anonymous and fake application to PCP, and the relevant public servant will be defamed consequently. PCP is even entertaining and forwarding the anonymous applications to the relevant departments for inquiry and further action. I am also a public servant and a full time faculty member at a public sector university in Pakistan, and here I would like to share my own first hand personal experience with PCP’s anonymous applications.

Culture of anonymous applications is really catastrophic for organizations and departments operating in Pakistan and employees working there

There are considerable legal anomalies in PCP in registration and application submission procedures. There are important issues of credibility, authenticity and identity of applicants and applications. I will discuss only issues of identity of applications submitted to PCP.

Firstly, in PCP database, there are serious issues of identity, credibility and authenticity. There are a number of flaws in PCP which is an online smartphone app on which anybody can register, they can even use a fake name, address, CNIC number, telephone number or address. How can the PCP app check and verify who is registering and submitting the application? For example, anybody can submit an anonymous application to the PCP using his/her account or an account of a friend. Traditionally in this world, an application is invalid and meaningless without signature, name and address or some other legal information like passport number or identity card number. In legal court cases, courts always collect the complete information of the applicants and then proceed. No court entertains an anonymous application in this world. But PCP just started this new tradition of anonymous applications in Pakistan, and now justice and relief is being delivered online through a faulty App.

Secondly, in PCP, applicants can hide their identity and this anonymity of applications posted on PCP is a major legal issue. Anonymous applications with fake and false allegations against someone is a serious point of concern. I personally have seen two anonymous applications with fake and false allegations against me posted by someone on PCP and my university marked an inquiry against me. My university even entertained these anonymous applications and disgraced me on the basis of these anonymous applications which were submitted without name, address, signature or CNIC number. Hence, Pakistanis are using PCP to dishonor employees working in an organization. Any employee in an organization can be easily victimized and targeted now in Pakistan just by submitting an anonymous application against him or her.

Moreover, processing anonymous applications with false allegations is a futile, unfair and aimless practice and it is a waste of time. In public sector organizations in Pakistan, formal inquiry of any kind of an employee may have far-ranging aftermath in his or her career. Culture of anonymous applications is really catastrophic for organizations and departments operating in Pakistan and employees working there.

Thirdly, the PCP platform is being misused in institutional politics now in Pakistan. Institutional politics are very common across the globe; in an organizational structure, political groupings and loyalties are usually found and organizations in Pakistan are notorious for unnecessary and muddy institutional politics. In Pakistan, employees and other collaborators are now misusing the forum in order to bring their opponents down. Most of the time, anonymous applications with false allegation against the opponents are used to label, stigmatize or victimize them in that relevant organization. For instance, an anonymous application posted on PCP with fake and false gender based harassment allegations is the easiest way to dishonor someone, whether they be male or female.

There is a dire need to remove the many legal pitfalls in the PCP database and I would like to suggest some legal measures to improve the quality of PCP. A strict mechanism to check and verify the complete legal identity of applicants should be introduced. PCP should take an online signed undertaking from applicants with their complete name, father’s name, signature, address, scanned CNIC copy, CNIC number and photograph and this undertaking should be attached with the signed application and then the application should be sent to the relevant department to probe.

Although the PM claimed in his address on 28 October 2018, that NADRA will share data with PCP, there are still many legal flaws left. In addition to this, the Government of Pakistan should run PCP under the umbrella of NADRA on a NADRA website and in this way; NADRA can easily verify the personal information provided by an applicant directly online. Lastly, there should be no room or possibility available for anonymous application submissions in the database of PCP, and PCP should forward applications to the relevant departments with the complete information of the applicant. In this way, only serious and genuine applicants will submit applications with due responsibility.

No doubt, PCP is good move, but its structure should be overhauled and its in-built legal loopholes should be minimized. Otherwise, employees working in organizations in Pakistan will become easy prey for mala fide political elements or stakeholders present inside or outside their relevant organization.

Published in Daily Times, February 7^th 2019.