ISLAMABAD: The provincial bureaucracy has expedited efforts to take back control of the administrative posts in the four provinces as it challenged in court a notification to increase the allocation of provincial seats to federal bureaucrats.

The establishment division had on March 12 amended Rule 17 of the Civil Service of Pakistan (Compo­sition and Cadre) Rules 1954, changing the composition of provincial bureaucracy and increasing the number of posts of the Pakistan Administrative Service (PAS) from 299 to 1,121.

The Peshawar High Court is likely to take up a petition to set aside the March 12 notification in the first week of April, while the Senate Standing Committee on Cabinet will take up the same issue in mid-April.

Interestingly, the Senate Standing Committee on Cabinet had last month directed “the establishment division to refer the matter to Dr Ishrat Hussain for addressing the grievances of the provincial officers according to the Constitution and merit” and sought a report in two months.

Establishment division has amended rules to increase number of PAS posts in provinces

As per the statistics of the All Pakistan Provincial Civil Services Association (APPCSA), their total sanctioned posts in the four provinces stand at 5,513 — 2,038 in Punjab, 1,757 in Sindh 1,346 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and 372 in Balochistan. The APPCSA claimed that sanctioned posts of PAS were 147, but the cadre held 1,947 posts.

The APPCSA challenged in the Peshawar High Court the March 12 notification about change in the rules, saying that “as a direct result of this almost four-fold increase in the number of posts reserved for federal officers, the chances of promotion of provincial civil servants have been slashed drastically. It has become almost impossible for provincial civil servants to rise to the top positions in the bureaucracy of their own province, which is quite an irony for a federal system”.

The petition stated: “This radical reshaping of the system has been done without a constitutional amendment or an Act of Parliament or even by Rules... The impugned Executive Order is an affront to the Constitution and the laws of Pakistan and is liable to be set aside…”

The APPCSA is of the view that the federal government makes appointments on posts in connection with the affairs of Federation and All Pakistan Services under Article 240 (a) of the Constitution, whereas clause (b) of the same article empowers the provincial assemblies to increase or decrease the number of administrative posts of their respective provinces.

It may be mentioned that the March 12 notification allocated four posts of chief secretaries in the four provinces for PAS, in addition to five posts of additional chief secretaries/members of the Board of Revenue in Balochistan, 21 in Punjab, 16 in Sindh and 11 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

As far as the posts of division commissioners and administrative secretaries are concerned, the Centre took a total of 229 seats — 30 seats in Balochistan, 85 in Punjab, 67 in Sindh and 47 in KP. Likewise, it took 268 seats of the deputy commissioners — 25 in Balochistan, 117 in Punjab, 59 in Sindh and 67 in KP — and 318 seats of additional deputy commissioners — 26 in Balochistan, 155 in Punjab, 85 in Sindh and 52 in KP. Total 247 seats of assistant commissioners handed over to the federal bureaucrats included 21 in Balochistan, 65 in Punjab, 98 in Sindh and 63 in KP.

APPCSA spokesman Tariq Malik said similar petitions challenging the the March 12 notification were pending before the Supreme Court, IHC and SHC.

Published in Dawn, March 24th, 2021