Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: A divisional bench of the top court was surprised when the Joint Secretary Education of the Capital Administration and Development Division (CADD), informed that the health care units situated in the rural areas of Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT), fall under the jurisdiction of the commissioner and the ministry of interior.

Justice Qazi Faez Isa, the member of the two-judge bench, observed that a commissioner’s job is to look after the law and order situation adding how could the ministry manage health care when it cannot even handle arms licencing properly.

CADD’s Joint Secretary Education, Ayesha Farooq, appeared before the apex bench headed by Justice Amir Hani Muslim, which on Tuesday took up the suo moto case regarding alleged gross corruption in the supply of nitrogen and oxygen gases and theft of medicines from Poly Clinic Hospital Islamabad.

Responding to a query regarding temporary administrators and vacant seats in hospitals, she stated that recruitment rules were flawed due which recruitment could not be possible adding that technicalities from different authorities including the Establishment Division and the Higher Education Commission (HEC) were involved.

She said that Poly Clinic Hospital, the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) and the National Institute of Rehabilitative Medicine (NIRM) were run under the CADD while few hospitals were run by the health ministry, the commissioner of Islamabad and the mayor. There is an unprepared devolution of powers after the 18th Amendment due which the health system of the federal capital was fractured, she added.

However, Justice Isa, while expressing dissatisfaction over the reply snubbed the joint secretary asking as to why the secretary CADD was not present during the course of hearing?

“The top lawyers of the country and heads of the teaching institutions are before the Supreme Court but for no use because there is no will. If there was the matter of perks and privileges they would have come with the petition,” observed Justice Isa.

Justice Amir Hani Muslim observed that the lives of poor patients were at stake and officials were playing with the rules adding that the government had not yet enacted the initial rules for recruitment. The administrator of PIMS stated that they had started the recruitment process from BPS 1 to 5 and would finalise it within two weeks. However, for BPS 17 and onwards there were certain clarifications which were required from the statutory bodies. “In other words this process would not be finalised,” the court observed.

During the course of the hearing Deputy Attorney General, Nayab Gardezi, submitted a report wherein the construction of new hospitals in ICT was mentioned on which Justice Hani remarked that this logic was beyond understanding that the government, instead of improving the health care units, providing basic facilities in the already established public sector hospitals, was constructing new hospitals.

He further observed that the FIR over the corruption should have been registered on the very first day adding that a former justice was brought to the hospital but there was no ventilator for him.

“We must record our displeasure over the working of the institutions,” the court observed in its ruling. The top court further directed the Attorney General (AG) of Pakistan to ensure the framing of the rules in the first phase by the relevant authorities including the CADD and the Establishment Division within two weeks. “Recruitment for administrators by the competent authority should be processed immediately within the minimum time but the process must start within a week under the supervision of the AG,” the top court further ruled.