KARACHI: Non-technical staff being promoted in PTCL
By Bahzad Alam Khan
KARACHI, June 22: The employees of Pakistan Telecommunication Company Ltd having a Bachelor’s degree in engineering or an MS engineering or a PhD constitute only two per cent of the entire workforce.
Well-placed sources told Dawn that despite a low percentage of technical personnel in the national telecommunication company, which should be a cause of concern, the phone utility was still promoting non-technical workers. They pointed out, “This is being done despite the fact that after the deregulation of the telecommunications sector, the PTCL will soon have to work in a very competitive environment. Burdened with so many non-technical employees, the phone utility will not be able to operate at a profit in the changed scenario,” they added.
Analysts maintain that such a percentage of non-qualified personnel in a telecommunications company would be the highest in the entire world.
The minutes of the 79th PTCL board meeting, obtained by Dawn, say: “The board was informed that the existing policy for promotion or appointment in grade 17 for assistant divisional engineers entailed quota distribution 40 per cent for departmental employees and 60 per cent for direct recruits. Unfortunately, this distribution of quota at entry level has failed to provide a workforce of qualified people by promoting the departmental employees each year whereas the induction of graduate engineers could not be done,
resulting in accumulation of a large number of non-qualified people in management positions.
The situation becomes more abysmal in grade 18 and above, where these people have no qualification bar and even matriculates could reach the highest tier of management. The board was further informed that the number of personnel in the PTCL having a Bachelor’s degree or MS engineering or PhD are only two per cent of the total strength, which by no means is comparable with the other telecos.”
The sources told Dawn that the policy of inducting qualified engineers and department employees on a quota of 60 and 40 per cent respectively in grade 17 had been violated in the past. “That is way, at present there are more non- qualified personnel in the phone utility than the qualified engineers. If the policy had been faithfully followed, this would have been the other way around, because departmental employees, being senior to fresh engineering graduates, would have phased out.”
They said that through an order (vide RRR-1-17/2002), it was # decided that the quota of departmental employees would be decreased significantly and tied to an examination and more qualified staff would be engaged. “The order, which was issued on Nov 20, 2002, was withdrawn after two days on a flimsy excuse,” they added.
The sources said that some engineers of the PTCL had gone to court in Quetta against the decision of withdrawing the order. “The court was told that the PTCL had withdrawn the order on ‘verbal directions given by the senior civil judge East, Karachi’. Everybody knows that verbal orders have no legal standing. Nevertheless, the PTCL chose to withdraw the decision in two days which had been implemented after many months,” they said.
The sources said that a seniority list issued by the PTCL recently promoted a large number of non-qualified personnel over the ones having technical knowledge and expertise.
