LAHORE, May 10: The Punjab government on Wednesday notified the creation of public prosecution service. It also notified that the prosecutor general would head the service, controlling all district deputy and assistant public prosecutors in the province.

Sources said over Rs300 million had been allocated for the office of the prosecutor general for running the entire set up created to represent the province in criminal cases in courts.

The service has been created under the Access to Justice Programme of the Asian Development Bank, but officials said no funds committed by the bank had so far been utilised.

So far everything had been done with the money given by the provincial government, and the ADB funds would be utilised to provide offices and other paraphernalia to the law officers, the sources said.

The public prosecution department was created after the Punjab Assembly passed a related law last month.

A majority of the district and deputy district attorneys who were under the command of the provincial law department have already opted for the new service and they would formally be inducted in the next few days.

Officials said the attorneys would be placed in the three ranks according to their existing pay scales. Those in BS-17 would be posted as assistant prosecutors, in BS-18 as deputy public prosecutors and in BS-19 as district public prosecutors. —Intikhab Hanif