13 officers ignored in posting of joint chief economist

Mehtab Haider

ISLAMABAD: The government has posted Rizwan Bashir, an influential DMG officer of grade 20, as joint chief economist in the Planning and Development Division by ignoring 13 officers of the economists group in the same grade, it is learnt.
“Now the career of ten officers of the Planning Commission is directly at stake because Rizwan Bashir, a grade 20 officer, will not be able to sign ACRs (Annual Confidential Reports) of the same grade officers of economists group for promotions in grade 21,” official sources confirmed to The News here on Monday.
According to office order number 5 (53) Admn-VI/PD/13 dated March 22, 2013, a copy of which is available with The News, Rizwan Bashir Khan, joint secretary has been posted as Joint Secretary/Director General (Infrastructure), Projects Wing, Planning & Development Division with immediate effect and until further orders. He will also look after the work of the post of Joint Chief Economist (Operations) until the posting of a regular incumbent.”
The economists group is considered as rudderless ship in which top guns only protected their petty vested interests instead of promoting career planning for young economists mostly grade 17 and 18.
Currently, there is one post for grade 22 in the economists group, which is falling vacant, three posts in grade 21 of which 2 are vacant and four posts are vacant in grade 20.
In the last meeting of the selection board for promoting officers, the group failed to get any promotion mainly because the former chief economist Jaffer Qamar remained untraceable so he could not sign the officers’ ACRs for three months. Some officers of the group such as Samiullah, Dr Alibad Khan and others could not be promoted from grade 20 to 21 in last board meeting.
The rules are devised in such a way that excluded certain officers from getting promotion and DMG became the major beneficiary to which even the secretariat group raised objections.
The economists group has been ignored to such an extent that the government has appointed a police officer of Azad Jammu and Kashmir as DG Pakistan Planning Management Institute (PPMI).
Mr Rizwan Bashir was also victim of rules devised for getting promotion from grade 20 to 21 in the last selection board meeting because he had attended the mandatory training course, which was not made part of career under the newly devised rules so his promotion was deferred.
When contacted Secretary Planning and Development Division, Hasan Nawaz Tarar on Monday said they have made a stopgap arrangement by giving additional charge of joint chief economist to Rizwan Bashir as basically he was posted as DG Infrastructure Project Wing of Planning Division. “It is a temporary arrangement,” he added. Rizwan Bashir possessed the relevant experience as he has worked with the Asian Development Bank before assuming charge to look after external finance in Finance Ministry, he concluded.

The News