Daily Times

Falling under administrative control of National Heritage and Culture Division of Federal Education Ministry, Lok Virsa is passing through worse administrative circumstances, Daily Times has learnt reliably. As per available documents, over a dozen employees were made jobless while contradicting established practices and laws apparently over personal grudge as the authorities have no justification for sudden firing of these employees.

Offices of the Consultant Technical, responsible for conceiving, implementing, and supervising projects, and that of Consultant Events and PR, who on the record earned millions of rupees for Lok Virsa, have been locked. It was followed by locking the office of the Consultant as Cultural Historian and incharge of academics responsible for conducting training and enhancing skills under the Prime Minister’s Youth Programme.

Following the unwanted behavior, Consultant Technical Naeem Safi sent a legal notice to Secretary Culture Division Naheed Durrani. He was allegedly mistreated and then illegally removed by locking his office. The action is a sheer violation of basic human rights, the constitution and the relevant laws, read the legal notice that was obtained by Daily Times.

When contacted, Safi said that a written complaint was officially submitted in the office of the secretary concerned against Joint Secretary Junaid Akhlaq, present Additional ED at the Lok Virsa, but no corrective action was taken. A deep non-serious behavior is that neither his complaint letter nor legal notice was replied.

“This shows collusion of the ED, the secretary and the minister concerned Shafqat Mehmood, the illegal steps were not incidents that happened by chance,” he maintained.

Another official said while wishing anonymity that ousted casual employees did nothing wrong that warranted derogatory steps. He added that the situation has seriously mutilated the National Institute of Folk and Traditional Heritage (Lok Virsa), supposed to be a vital national-level cultural organization, as key operations were halted.

“After their ousting, several projects concerning UNESCO, the Ministry of Commerce and others are in doldrums as the institute now has no professional capacity to handle these. Even no event was organized after ousting them except one that was already scheduled by the ousting consultant. Skills programmes and projects under GI Act 2020 were also stopped,” a senior official said while requesting anonymity.

The non-professional handling of affairs that also surpasses the mandate of the interim administration is damaging the reputation of the ministry and the institute as well, one of the senior officials said. These actions could undermine the positive image of Pakistan established by a recently ratified UNESCO 2005 Convention on culture and as experts maintain, such irresponsible steps could have international repercussions.

One of the employees shared a video showing that instructions were issued to ban entries of the mentioned consultants to the Lok Virsa, a public place where every citizen is allowed to visit. Despite repeated attempts, Secretary Culture Division Naheed Durrani could not be contacted for her version.

Sources at the Heritage and Culture Division told this scribe that some quarters at the ministry were not happy with the former ED on personal reasons and as his tenure expired, all members of the team that he recruited on professional bases were targeted by the additional ED. Moreover, let alone the current employees, new appointments were being made in a suspicious way. a
The ministry is influencing appointments on its wish list. Former ED was asked to appoint a woman as Incharge Admin and Accounts on contract and he did so with issuing a letter, a copy of which is available with Daily Times, to ascertain her claimed credentials, but the letter was stopped from playing its due role and her credentials remained without any enquiry. Former ED Talha Kushvaha confessed that the personal secretary to the minister for Heritage Division Waqas Afridi asked him to appoint her as Incharge Admin. It is worth to note that Lok Virsa is supposed to be an autonomous body and it is the prerogative of the ED to search out the right person for the right job.