PESHAWAR, Jan 9: The NWFP government has overlooked the prosecution service in the Access to Justice Programme as the public prosecutors lack proper service structure and other required facilities.
Sources said that though the governor had promulgated the Prosecution Service (Constitution, Functions and Powers) Ordinance, 2004, on Aug 24, last year, no practical steps had been taken for improving the service structure of different categories of public prosecutors.
The ordinance was published in the official Gazette on Oct 10. The rules under the ordinance have yet to be notified by the government. The number of available prosecutors is also less keeping in view the increasing number of lower courts in the province.
The strength of judges including additional district and sessions judges and civil judges cum judicial magistrates was enhanced under the Access to Justice Programme, but the number of prosecutors were not increased in that proportion.
Last year the Punjab government had upgraded the posts of district attorneys as well as deputy and assistant district attorneys. The posts stood upgraded from BPS 18, 17 and 16 to BPS 19, 18 and 17, respectively.
In the NWFP the post of district public prosecutor, which is equivalent to district attorney, is still in BPS 18. The different tiers of prosecutors in the NWFP are: district, additional, deputy and assistant public prosecutors who have been functioning in BPS 18, 17, 16 and 14, respectively.
Keeping in view the up gradation of the posts in Punjab, officials here believe that the post of district prosecutors should be upgraded to BPS 19, additional PPs to BPS 18, deputy PPs to BPS 17 and assistant PPs to BPS 16.
The officials said that the judiciary and the police force remained focus of attention in the Asian Development Bank's funded Access to Justice Programme, whereas the prosecution service, which is also an important component of the criminal justice system, is yet to receive its due share in the programme.
Some of the prosecutors said that they were even short of proper libraries and law books. They said that they had to borrow books from bar rooms and lawyers. They said that in some of the stations a single prosecutor had to appear before different courts and he could not give proper time to all cases.
It was learnt that the prosecution inspectors and sub-inspectors, who were previously serving in the prosecution branch of the police and had joined the prosecution service under the law department about three years ago, were placed in disadvantaged position as they were receiving less salary as compared to their previous service in the police at present.
The sources said that about 66 prosecution inspectors and sub-inspectors had joined the prosecution service in Feb 2002. The posts of prosecution inspectors were designated as deputy public prosecutor, whereas those of prosecution sub-inspectors were designated as assistant public prosecutors.
One of the prosecutors told Dawn that during their service in the police department they used to receive various allowances, but after they joined the prosecution service, those allowances were abolished and were at present receiving about Rs1200 less than their previous salaries.
He said that under the Esta Code, that explains the rules for public servants, a salary of a public servant could not be reduced. "We submitted various applications before the competent authorities, but our grievances have not been addressed till date," he added.
In past both the police and law departments used to manage the prosecution service in two tiers: At sessions court level the law department looked after the service and on magisterial level the police managed it.
On Jan 29, 2002, the provincial government ordered separation of the prosecution branch of the police and placed it under the law department. The provincial government issued a notification on Mar 17, 2004, through which the prosecution directorate was created under the administrative control of home department.
