PESHAWAR, May 9: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government on Monday approved a set of recommendations for what it claimed improving service delivery and containing malpractices of patwaris in the province.

Recommendations formulated by a cabinet committee for restructuring the revenue and estate department were presented before a cabinet meeting here on Monday with Chief Minister Ameer Haider Khan Hoti in the chair, Infor-mation Minister Mian Iftikhar Hussain told a new briefing after the session.

The provincial cabinet reviewed and approved the recommendations in toto, the minister said and added a committee under additional chief secretary would come up with an implementation plan for these proposals within six weeks.

Sharing some major recommendations of the committee, the minister said that it envisaged giving status of a separate department to the Board of Revenue (BoR) by putting the revenue and estate department under its subordination.

Currently, the BoR operates as an attached department to the revenue and estate department, which, according to the minister, undermines its superiority. Following this change, he said, the BoR would be able to effectively handle affairs relating to revenue and land management.

Likewise, the cabinet also agreed to the recommendations of entrusting the divisional commissioners with more administrative powers over the revenue staff operating at local level. The establishment department, he said, would amend the relevant laws to change the nomenclature of the revenue officer.

The cabinet also approved creation of 200 additional posts of patwaris and 81 of qanoongo to shed extra workload on the existing manpower. Similarly, the basic pay scale of patwaris would be upgraded from existing scale 5 to 9 and the scale of qanoongo will be upgraded from grade 9 to 11.

To prevent patwaris developing vested interests by sticking to a particular post for longer than usual, the cabinet decided to fire those patwaris who forego promotion to next grade on their turn. For this purpose, amendments will be introduced in the service rules, the minister said.

The provincial cabinet also approved upgrading the basic qualification for patwaris from matric to intermediate with computer literacy as additional and compulsory qualification.

The cabinet also sanctioned relocation of Revenue Academy from Karak to Peshawar, where refresher and pre-service courses would be conducted for the officials, the minister maintained.

The cabinet also approved establishment of record rooms for preserving the revenue record on scientific lines besides restoring the revenue collection through lamberdars .

He said the cabinet also directed the finance department to allocate sufficient resources for implementation of measures envisaged in this report in the next provincial budget.

Apart from approving restructuring of the revenue administration, Mr Hussain said the cabinet also endorsed the views of elementary and secondary education concerning pasting the photos of female candidates on the secondary school certificate examination form. This decision, he claimed, would ensure transparency in the examination system.

The cabinet also approved naming different healthcare facilities in the public sector after those prominent personalities, who have served the people of this province one way or the other, he said.

As per the decision, City Hospital Kohat Road had been renamed as Naseerullah Khan Babar Memorial Hospital, City Children Hospital as Safwat Ghayyur Memorial Hospital, Women and Children Hospital as Maulvi Amir Shah Qaderi Memorial Hospital, Pabbi Tehsil Headquarters Hospital as Mian Rashid Hussain Memorial Hospital and Tehsil Headquarters Hospital Matta, Swat as Zakir Khan Shaheed Memorial Hospital.

The cabinet also reviewed the implementation status of its previous decisions on different issues.