KP all set to regularise thousands of directly recruited employees

PESHAWAR: The Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa government is all set to regularise the services of thousands of employees, directly recruited for various projects during the past four years, in violation of clear Supreme Court orders.

The provincial cabinet has approved a bill in this regard, which will be presented in the KP Assembly during Sunday’s session for approval.

According to official documents available with the reporter, the provincial government directly hired 4,800 temporary employees without any national testing service (NTS) test for 54 different projects. Most of them are Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf workers and relatives of ministers and party leaders.

During the cabinet meeting, the chief minister insisted on approval of the bill despite opposition from some ministers. The provincial law department also objected to bill because of the clear Supreme Court orders in this regard. The SC order says that neither any employee could be hired directly in grade 17 and above nor given promotion, as it would be a violation of fundamental rights of those hired through the Public Service Commission, or any other tests in accordance with the rules and regulations.

The law department has opposed the move in writing.

According to sources, the chief minister has taken special interest in the bill, and got it included in the today’s assembly session agenda. However, the opposition and ruling party members had presented 152 amendments to the bill for inclusion of the names of the employees recruited for different projects during the previous tenures. That was why the bill was not presented in the house earlier.

However, this time a new strategy has been adopted and the bill would be presented in the house on some appropriate time, without formally including it in the agenda.

Sources said that with the regularisation of these employees, the finance department would have to bear additional burden of millions of rupees monthly. However, no formal approval has been sought so far from the Finance Department for regularisation of these employees.