ACE arrests district revenue assistant from DC office : Administrative staff go on pen down strike to protest arrest

RAWALPINDI: The Anti-Corruption Establishment (ACE) has arrested District Revenue Assistant (DRA) from Deputy Commissioner (DC) office Thursday in a corruption case, filed in 2001.

DRA Khalid Hasan is a senior officer, working in DC office. The administrative staff of local administration has stopped working and gone on pen down strike and gathered outside DC office to record their protest after this incident.

The ACE had neither informed commissioner nor deputy commissioner and arrested an on duty officer from DC office.

Deputy Commissioner Capt ® Anwar-ul-Haq and Additional District Collector Revenue (ADCR) Capt ® Muhammad Shoaib assured the protesters to take up this issue and told them to investigate this matter that why ACE arrested an on duty officer from DC office.

But, despite DC assurance, administrative staff of local administration did not call off strike.

Already, civil servants, working in different government departments, have accused Anti-Corruption Establishment (ACE) of harassment.

The employees of Rawalpindi Development Authority (RDA), Metropolitan Corporation Rawalpindi (MCR), Water and Sanitation Agency (WASA), Parks and Horticultural Authority (PHA), Rawalpindi Waste Management Company (RWMC), District Education Department (DED) and Regional Transport Authority (RTA) have expressed grave concerns about harassment at the hands of ACE.

The ACE, Rawalpindi, has registered FIRs against senior most officers of grade 17, 18 and 19, while several FIRs have been registered against the lower staff of different departments under the control of local administration only in the past two months.

It is pertinent to mention that majority of public sector departments are without officers, while several seats of grade 14, 16, 17, 18 and 19 have been lying vacant for a long time and have not been filled.