RAWALPINDI, Jan 17: The Punjab government is working on introduction of a new system of "municipal magistracy" after separation of judiciary from executive under the local government system.

This was stated by the provincial minister for local government and parliamentary affairs, Mohammad Basharat Raja, while administering oath to the newly-elected office-bearers of the local chapter of All Pakistan Clerks Association (APCA) at Rawalpindi Press Club on Saturday.

The minister said the provincial government had already started work on the new system and would soon introduce it through proper legislation.

After taking away the executive powers from magistrates, there was no authority to check unbridled price-hike and profiteering or to impose penalties on the violators, he added.

The government, he said, had requested the high court to empower few judicial officers to check profiteering during Ramazan and Muharram. However, those were just temporary arrangements and not permanent solution to the issue, he added.

"There is a need for introducing a system, wherein the municipal magistrates would have the powers to check price-hike and profiteering in the Punjab."

Mr Raja said like in Lahore, the Punjab chief minister Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi would soon inaugurate a housing scheme in Rawalpindi for the government employees.

Under the scheme, only those employees will be awarded plots, who had no plots in their names so far.

The provincial minister said amending the laws of the colonial era and making these practical and in accordance with the requirements of the present age was the need of the hour. The Punjab government has so far tabled 25 new bills in the provincial assembly, which is a record, he added.

He said the Punjab chief minister had announced a grant of Rs200 million for Murree. Out of this total amount, Rs100 million has been released so far, he added.

He urged the APCA office-bearers to hold talks with the government for finding solutions to the pending issues. Problems cannot be solved through protests only, he added.

Mr Raja said he would try to arrange a meeting between the APCA office-bearers and the government, besides reviewing the Termination from Services Special Power Ordinance 2000.

Earlier, the APCA central president, Fazal Mabood Khan, urged the government to reimplement the Efficiency and Discipline (E&D) Rules, 1975. He also called for increase in the salaries of the employees according to rate of inflation in the country.

Tehsil Naib Nazim Sajjad Khan highlighted the problems faced by the clerks and warned that they would launch a protest campaign if the government did not meet their demands.

On the occasion, the provincial minister also administered oaths to the new APCA office-bearers including Iftikhar Ahmed (president), Chaudhry Zafar Ali (general secretary), Sardar Mohammad Zaheer (vice-president), Raja Rashid Javid (senior vice- president), junior vice presidents Tariq Idrees and Tehseen Shaad, Chaudhry Ashraf Tahir (press secretary) and Bashir Ahmed Butt (deputy general secretary).