22 May 2004	Saturday	02 Rabi-us-Saani 1425

LAHORE, May 21: Punjab National Accountability Bureau director-general Maj-Gen Masood Alam has said the NAB had recovered nearly Rs180 billion from the corrupt during three years.

He was speaking at the prize giving ceremony of a pictorial competition on 'Fight against corruption' organized by the Punjab Textbook Board for schoolchildren here on Friday.

Gen Alam said the government had brought the corrupt to justice without any discrimination. The NAB did not claim to have weeded out the corruption completely but had at least put a check on it, he maintained.

He said the country was once ranked as the second most corrupt in the world because the nation forgot the ideals for which Pakistan was founded. He said drives against corruption failed in the past because only the opponents of the government were targeted.

Gen Alam said the NAB had set up an Anti-Corruption Strategy Wing to create awareness against the menace. Punjab Textbook Board chairperson Dr Fauzia Saleemi said the pictorial competition had been arranged to create an awareness about corruption among the children.