The Senate Standing Committee on Information Technology, while showing annoyance over the violation of provincial quota in Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA), directed its chairman to submit complete details of hiring made during the last three years.
A meeting of the senate body on Information Technology, held under the chairmanship of Senator Muhammad Idrees Khan in the Parliament house, expressed annoyance over violations in the observance of the provincial quota while making appointments in PTA. The committee showed its concerns over no specific seats for minorities in the provincial quota.
The standing committee directed chairman PTA to evolve a ratio over 5 percent and checked how many seats could be specified for provinces following their quota. The committee directed PTA to evolve provincial seats according to the population of each province.
The legislative body resented the information provided by the officials, that there were no specific seats for minorities in PTA at the provincial level. Officials informed the committee that before 2008, provincial quotas were not being observed in PTA. Officials informed that currently, 32 less people are employed at the provincial level in PTA. The committee observed that people were hired on the basis of nepotism and a merit system was not followed, therefore deserving candidates are ignored. The committee directed chairman PTA to give details of recruitment including pay scale, place of appointment, place of birth and domiciles to the committee.
During the meeting, Chairman PTA Farooq Awan informed the committee that the incoming traffic in the country is two billion minutes while outgoing traffic is about 120 million minutes.
Chairman PTA said that the government is devising a strategy to establish an International Clearance House (ICH) immediately.
Members said that people abroad enjoyed more calling time at cheap rates while in Pakistan, the situation is the converse. The committee directed the chairman PTA to bring a comprehensive policy to remove variations in calling rates between local and international levels.
The standing committee was concerned over the slow pace of work by the Universal Service Fund in remote areas of the country, and said that USF had not completed projects in less developed areas of the country including, Sindh, Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa. The committee said that USF had awarded contracts to those defaulting cellular operators.
In this regard, the standing committee constituted a sub-committee, to check the performance of USF in remote areas of the country under Hassan Mandokhel and directed it to complete its report quickly.
