Government to pay off deceased employees' plot instalments: Soomro approves package

Prime Minister Muhammedmian Soomro has approved assistance package that includes payment by the government for remaining instalments of plots allotted to the families of government employees who died while in service, official sources told Business Recorder, here on Friday.
Giving the background, the sources said that the Auditor General of Pakistan had submitted a summary to former prime minister Shaukat Aziz, requesting waiver of balance instalments of the plot allotted by the Federal Government Employees Housing Foundation (FGEHF) in favour of Arif Mansoor, a Grade-22 officer of Audit and Accounts Group and Secretary Privatisation Division, who along with his wife expired in a tragic road accident in Saudi Arabia on July 9, 2007, the sources added.
Shaukat, while approving the proposal, had directed the Establishment Division to move a formal summary for amending the assistance package to effect waiver of the balance amount of plot allotted by the FGEHF, in case where both husband and wife have expired and their dependents are unable to pay the instalment of plot, the sources continued.
The existing assistance package provides for waiver of only the unpaid balance of house building for which a new clause has been proposed to be incorporated in the package: "Waiver of unpaid amount of plot allotted by FGEHF in cases where both husband and wife have expired and their dependents are unable to pay the cost of the plot."
The sources said the existing assistance package provides employment for family members of the deceased government servants in BS-01 to BS-15 on a two-year contract. However, it has been brought to the notice of the Establishment Division that provincial governments were not entertaining such requests on the ground that APUG officers were under the administrative control of Establishment Division and the employment under assistance package would be provided by the federal government.
Keeping in view the arguments of the provincial governments, the Division had proposed modification in the package as under: "Employment for posts in BS-01 to BS-15 on two years contract without advertisement to the children or widow/widower of a deceased employee will be provided by the ministries/divisions/provincial governments/departments/organisations where anyone was posted immediately after his/her death.
Soomro while approving the package on February 27 directed that instead of waiver, the payment of the balance amount of the plot of the deceased would be paid by the government, the sources added.