Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: Auditor General (AG) of Pakistan Rana Assad Amin has said the department is committed to progressing towards improvement in service delivery and redress of difficulties faced by pensioners.

He was chairing a meeting of senior officers of Department of Auditor General of Pakistan on Thursday. The auditor general convened this special meeting to monitor progress on implementation of decisions regarding pensioner facilitation taken by the department. The decisions were endorsed and approved by the Finance Minister Ishaq Dar back in October 16, 2015. It is pertinent to mention here that it is the constitutional mandate of the auditor general under Article-170 of the constitution to give directions as to the maintenance of accounts of the federation and the provinces. Since his taking charge of the office, the auditor general has been paying special attention to improve service delivery to pensioners with special focus on simplification of procedural steps involved and provision of utmost facilitation to pensioners. In this regard, he directed to coordinate with all stakeholders for speedy and timely compliance of the decisions.

As a backdrop, it may be noted that the auditor general had instituted a high-level committee on ‘Pensioner Facilitation’ in September 2015. Based on recommendations of the committee, the auditor general made a presentation to the finance minister on October 16, 2015. Broadly, six decisions were approved for implementation. The first decision was on generation of quarterly computerised list of superannuating officers/officials and sending these to executives concerned for initiating pension process. The second decision asked for making Direct Credit System (DCS) mandatory for all the existing pensioners. The third one required simplification of pension forms. The fourth decision was to appoint welfare officers in all ministries/divisions. The fifth one envisaged development of Pension Management Information System. The sixth, and the final decision, was meant for banks and Pakistan Post to generate facilitation systems for pensioners. Meetings to review progress on above recommendations have been routinely held on fortnightly basis in his office.

The auditor general was briefed on point-to-point basis regarding the implementation status. It was highlighted that joint efforts of the DAGP, Ministry of Finance, Controller General of Accounts, National Bank of Pakistan and provincial finance departments were underway to ensure implementation of the decisions. It was informed that majority of the decisions have already been implemented. With regard to DCS, it was updated that implementation has been started and is likely to be completed shortly.