Sindh's Public Accounts Committee (PAC) could not review 25 unsettled audit paras of over Rs 680 million of Health Department due to non-serious attitude of officials concerned. Expressing serious concern, PAC gave health department officials a one-week deadline for filing audit explanations.
PAC meeting held at committee Room-1 of Sindh Assembly building here on Tuesday. Sindh Chairman PAC Jam Tamachi Unar chaired the meeting. The newly posted Secretary Health Aftab Ahmed Khatri came with unverified working papers (Audit paras) of three Financial Years (FYs) including 2005-06, 2006-07 and 2007-08.
Objecting to the filing of unverified working papers, Jam Tamachi asked the Secretary Health why he had come without doing his home work. The secretary replied that his office had not been informed about the PAC meeting, that was why he could not get verified working papers from the audit office.
Jam Tamachi called his assistant to inquire about the matter. The assistant said that he had proof that someone from the health department had received a copy of the meeting's schedule a few days ago. In response, the PAC Chairman expressed anger over the Secretary health and his staff and directed the PAC staff to write a letter to the Chief Minister in this regard.
Later, Amir Moin Pirzada, one of the PAC members, asked the secretary health to serve show-cause notices on officials who were involved in this "non-serious" step and come back to the PAC with verified audit paras within a week. Talking to media persons, Jam Tamachi Unarr said that PAC should have a full-fledged secretariat, enabling it to work in a proper and independent manner. In the present circumstances, he said: "We are depending on the already overburdened Sindh Assembly staff."
Acknowledging flaws in the health department figures, he said: "This is why we have given one week to officials of the health department for verifying their audit paras." He said that PAC would also review audit paras of the irrigation department for three fiscal years on Wednesday (August 1).
Later, when this correspondent studied the health department's working papers, he found that there were 25 unsettled audit paras of more than Rs 680 million. The FY 2005-06 working paper showed that officials of the Public Health School, Hyderabad, had purchased physical assets worth millions of rupees without inviting tenders.
The same document also showed that the authorities of the Chandka Medical College Hospital, Larkana, had also bought various medical items worth millions of rupees from various suppliers without inviting tenders. In many paras of three fiscal years, it was found that officials concerned had not provided any record for purchases worth millions of rupees to the audit teams. This is the reason why paras are unsettled and it could be said that embezzlement of millions of rupees had occurred in several health department institutions.