PM brings back his trusted ‘Dr T’ to bolster efficiency

ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s long-time trusted bureaucrat, Dr Tauqir Shah, is rejoining his core team as an adviser in the Prime Minister’s Office.

Dr Tauqir, who was serving as executive director at the World Bank, recently resigned from his prestigious international role at the premier’s request. Shehbaz Sharif sought his return to bolster the efficiency and performance of his office. He has been given the status of federal minister.

Dr Tauqir, who is referred as “Dr T” by PM Shehbaz while referring files and matters to him, has an association spread over 28 years with the prime minister. He is considered as the most trusted and time-tested aide of PM Shehbaz Sharif.

Dr Tauqir, who joined the Pakistan Administrative Service (formerly DMG) in 1991, was first picked up by the then chief minister Punjab, Shehbaz Sharif -- a leader known for his demanding governance style -- as his deputy secretary following his reputation as a promising young officer.

Over the years, Dr Tauqir rose through the ranks, serving as principal secretary to CM Punjab and later as Principal Secretary to Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif.

His professionalism and integrity have been publicly acknowledged by Shehbaz, and despite intense scrutiny of his official conduct during General Pervez Musharraf’s rule and NAB chairman Javed Iqbal’s tenure, no wrongdoing was ever found against him. Notably, he declined to accept a government plot -- a privilege often availed by senior bureaucrats.

Following the end of the PDM government, Dr Tauqir continued as Principal Secretary to caretaker prime minister Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar before his appointment at the World Bank.

The Kakar-led caretaker cabinet bid him a rare farewell, praising his exceptional service. “Dr Tauqir is one of the most honest, hardworking, and balanced officers I have ever come across. His integrity is beyond question, and he served the federal government with utmost professionalism,” Kakar was quoted as saying in this newspaper.

Sources said that Dr Tauqir has now been inducted by the prime minister as an adviser after his dissatisfaction with day-to-day management of the PM office,

Dr Tauqir has been known for his balanced approach and creating desirable fusion of political requirements of government and legal and good governance imperatives. He is liked by the PM for his fearless truth-telling and policy advice on critically important issues.

The PM, according to sources, also feels that political dealing of parliamentarians, particularly of coalition parties, has been visibly lacking in the PM office during PMLNs present tenure, leading to restiveness among parliamentarians. A civil servant who has worked with Dr Tauqir said, “Politicians like Dr Tauqir for his respectful conduct, patience and having a deep understanding of political culture. On the other hand civil servants find him accessible, trustworthy and someone who is always there to offer a shoulder to cry on.” Shehbaz Sharif knows his successes have the share of Dr Tauqir’s knack for implementation and crises management owing to which Shehbaz had picked him as his principal secretary when he was 45. His strength lay in the independence of his advice. An audio-leak in 2022 had shown Dr Tauqir advising PM Shehbaz Sharif against an alleged favour sought by Maryam Nawaz for his son-in-law.

Over the last three decades Shehbaz Sharif has depended so much on him that this time around when Dr T was gone, he felt his absence, said a source.

Those who know Dr Tauqir believe that in his new role as powerful aide of PM, he would avoid limelight. “You will see he is mostly present but not visible, he is liked not feared,” commented a bureaucrat. During his tenure at the World Bank, Pakistan secured all time high commitment of $40 billion under the World Bank Group’s Country Partnership Framework (CPF) for the next decade.

Dr Tauqir has also held senior roles in various UN agencies, including the UNDP, ILO, and the International Trade Centre in Geneva. A key milestone in his career was his tenure as Pakistan’s ambassador to the WTO (2015-2018), where he chaired the WTO Committee on Trade and Environment and served as a judge on a high-profile trade dispute panel between Russia and the US.

Dr Tauqir holds an MSc from the University of Manchester as a Chevening Scholar. He is a fellow of LEAD International, has served on the Board of Governors of LEAD Pakistan, and holds prestigious fellowships from Brown University, Duke University, and the Netherlands’ Sustainability Challenge Foundation.

Dr Tauqir topped all training courses throughout his career in civil service. Despite his exemplary record, Dr Tauqir found himself sidelined during Prime Minister Imran Khan’s tenure, where he was made an Officer on Special Duty (OSD) and overlooked for promotion to Grade-22. Belonging to a prominent landowning family from Sangjani, Islamabad, with extensive holdings in Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Dr Tauqir is widely respected in the civil service for his humility and problem-solving approach.