Cabinet meeting: Federal employees left high and dry

ISLAMABAD: The government on Thursday reversed its decision for providing honorarium equal to three basic pays for all employees of the federal government keeping in view the required cost of Rs93 billion and decided to provide three honorarium to a selected few employees of ministries involved in budget making process with the approval of Minister in Charge.

Minister for Finance Dr Miftah Ismail on Thursday night confirmed to The News that the government approved a summary of the Finance Division that Minister in Charge might award three honorarium to certain number of employees of selected ministries, including Planning and Development, Finance, Revenue and Prime Minister's Office. Earlier, he said that some confusion had surfaced on this issue.

According to earlier notification issued by Secretary to the Prime Minister Fawad Hassan Fawad on May 25, 2018 stating that the PM/Chairman of the ECC has seen and is pleased to order that all employees of the federal government shall be given honorarium equivalent to three basic pays for financial year 2017-18. No exception shall be allowed for payment in excess of the ceiling in any case.

The prime minister has further desired that for the financial year 2018-19 onwards, a policy may be formulated by the new elected government after Elections 2018. The sources said that actually different ministries proposed different honorarium requests to PM so the premier was advised to grant uniform formula to all employees without considering its exact cost.

When the budget wing of the Finance Ministry calculated on the basis of all employees of the federal government, they were stunned to witness its escalating cost to the tune of Rs93 billion.

After issuance of this notification, the Finance Ministry took a strong exception and informed the premier that if all employees of federal government, including civilian and military, could cause heavy cost to the tune of Rs93 billion, the budget deficit might exceed 0.3 percent of GDP.

After second thought, the Finance Ministry forwarded another summary to Cabinet for reconsideration of approval under which the old practice for providing honorarium was restored as the Minister in Charge will grant approval of this facility for selected officers belonging to ministries/divisions involved in budget making process.

Meanwhile, the federal cabinet consigned the question of taking line of action in the Asghar Khan case to the next government.

The cabinet that had its last meeting here at the Prime Minister's Office took up the case as an agenda item since the apex court earlier in the day had asked it to take up the matter forthwith. The members of the cabinet reportedly were of the view that the matter needed thorough discussion and consideration before taking any final decision and for the reason it must be deferred to the next cabinet.