The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) has expressed serious concerns over the delay in data entry of declaration of income and assets of government officials due to use of an unapproved software provided by the Pakistan Automation Revenue Limited (PRAL).
Sources told Business Recorder on Wednesday that the NAB has requested the Establishment Division and Central Board of Revenue (CBR) to intervene in the matter for removing bugs and errors in PRAL's existing computer program. It said that the NAB is unable to obtain the necessary data from the Establishment Division due to lack of security features and errors in the existing software.
According to sources, the NAB has conveyed its reservations to the Establishment Division to take up the issue with the CBR. Details show that NAB, Establishment Division and PRAL had decided that PRAL would provide a tested and approved monitoring software for the ministries and other government departments.
In this connection, the PRAL provided unapproved software to Establishment Division. The Establishment Division is facing serious problems during the data entry of declaration of income and assets pro forma due to bugs and errors in the computer software. Subsequently, Establishment Division has prepared an error/bugs list, which was communicated to the PRAL for rectification.
The NAB has pointed out that the PRAL had agreed to provide the revised version of the software. Following testing of the new computer program, it was found that there were some serious loopholes pertaining to security matters.