ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Statistics Bureau (PBS) spokesperson Habibullah Khattak said on Tuesday that misinformation and non-cooperative behaviour during the process of census 2017 will lead towards the immediate penalty of 50,000 Rs and six months imprisonment.
Talking to PTV News, Habibullah Khattak said deployed officers of Pakistan Army will hold the powers of the magistrate and can fine the guilty without any delay.
“0.2 million army personnel will perform their duties in conducting census exercise and one would be accompanying each enumerator”, he informed.
He said that census is being conducted after a gap of 19 years, as the last time it was conducted in 1998.
He further said that population census is important, as a distribution of resources among federal government and provinces under National Finance Commission (NFC) award and numbers of seats in the National Assembly and the provincial assemblies are decided on the basis of the census.
To a question about overseas Pakistanis, he said that those Pakistanis would be counted who were present in the country during census exercise.
“A from 2A will be filled on sample basis after census exercise completes in June 2017, which will give details regarding migration, unemployment, fertility and disability,” he added.
Khattak said that training of all enumerators was completed and training of army personnel was underway.
He said that March 18 has been fixed as reference day and whosoever is present at the particular location on that day would be counted for the census.
He informed that those Afghan refugees who possess residential permit will also be listed in the records.
Furthermore, Balochistan will be covered fully in phase one while the remaining provinces will be divided into two phases, he said.
He said PBS has appointed 639 enumerators in the Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT) to undertake the census in 1278 blocks.
