National Assembly Standing Committee on Cabinet Secretariat has expressed serious concerns over Liver Transplant Centre (LTC) at a hospital of Islamabad that has not been made functional for the last seven years. The parliamentary panel constituted a sub-committee to investigate the reasons for this failure and fix responsibility.
The committee also unanimously passed "The Right to Free and Compulsory Education (Amendment) Bill, 2017." The committee met with Rana Muhammad Hayat Khan in the chair at the Parliament House on Tuesday and discussed various bills and the issues of Liver Transplant Centre at Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS).
The committee constituted a four-member sub-committee headed by MNA Rasheed Ahmad Khan to probe the reasons of failure of Liver Transplant Centre and fix responsibility against the responsible persons to penalise the culprits accordingly.
Expressing serious concern over delay of seven years in establishment of liver transplant centre at Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS), the committee recommended the Prime Minister to approve a summary for appointment of Dr Faisal Saud Dar as consultant liver transplant surgeon on contract basis with the proposed salary package of Rs 2.5 million and Dr Najmul Hassan Shah as director Liver Transplant Centre PIMS on contract basis with the proposed salary package of Rs 2 million. Both of these doctors are working at one of top private hospitals of Islamabad at present.
The members of the committee said that the centre could not be made functional due to lack of coordination and mismanagement of PIMS administration. The committee decided to fetch kind attention of the Prime Minister towards the said issue in order to make it functional without any further delay.
The committee also expressed concern over the stoppage of visa by Indian Embassy to the patients of liver transplant and recommended that concerned authorities may take up the issue with Indian Embassy for amicable solution of the issue. Vice Chancellor Shaheed Zulifikar Ali Bhutto Medical University/PIMS, Professor Dr Javed Akram said that nobody is ready to join government job for Liver Transplant Centre at PIMS at low salary package.
He said, "After the advertisement and interview, we selected Dr Faisal Saud Dar and Dr Najuml Hassan Shah and sent a summary for salary package to the Prime Minister for approval." He said that after the approval of the summary, the Liver Transplant Centre would start functioning within six to eight weeks.
The committee unanimously passed "The Right to Free and Compulsory Education (Amendment) Bill, 2017" moved by MNA Dr Fouzia Hameed. The committee directed the Printing Corporation of Pakistan (PCP) to expedite the process of procurement of printing machinery as per PPRA rules to meet the requirements of printing, especially during the upcoming general election.
The committee directed Capital Administration & Development Division (CA&AD) to pursue the case with CDA effectively to get the possession of remaining land for extension of National Institute of Rehabilitation Medicine (NIRM) hospital and report to the Committee in the meeting.
The members of the National Assembly Sardar Mansab Ali Dogar, Syed Javed Ali Shah, Sardar Muhammad Irfan Dogar, Parveen Masood Bhatti, Nighat Parveen Mir, Shahnaz Saleem, Seema Mohiuddin Jameeli, Farhana Qamar, Rasheed Ahmad Khan, Rana Qasim Noon, Dr Marheen Razaq Bhutto, Abdul Hakeem Baloch, Nafeesa Inayatullah Khan Khattak, Moulvi Agha Muhammad, Dr Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui, Syed Ali Raza Abidi and Dr Fouzia Hameed were present in the meeting.