SAHIWAL: Around 300 employees of the Board of Intermediate and Secondary Education, Sahiwal, could not draw their salaries for the month of December 2016 as the post of its chairman has been lying vacant since Nov 26 when its chairman, Dr Anwaar Ahmed, retired.

Dawn learnt from sources that the BISE administration has already reported the gravity of the matter to the secretaries of the Higher Education Department and the Punjab Boards Committee of Chairmen for redress of financial and administrative problems.

There is “unrest” among the employees due to financially issues besides the absence of chairman might affect the annual examination, scheduled to start from March 1.

Under the rules, only the chairman has the power of “drawing and disbursing officer” for the board employees. Presently, around 300 employees are working with the BISE, including regular, contractual and daily-wage workers.

They did not get their pay despite the fact that the Punjab Finance Department, in a separate circular, had approved payment to all of them on Dec 9, 2016.

BISE Sahiwal Employees Association president Chaudhry Afzal said no employee could draw salaries after the chairman’s retirement.

“In absence of chairman, no other officer can deal with the matter as his signatures are needed,” he added.

A source, on condition of anonymity, told Dawn that due to the absence of the chairman for more than the last 40 days, the administrative matters of the board were laying pending, compromising service delivery mechanism for the students.

The board administration is facing the delay of some important matters, including printing of 47,00,000 questions papers for secondary school certificate (SSC) and intermediate annual examinations, purchase of 16,00,000 answer books and 16,00,000 cover sheets and their delivery to examinations centres, court cases and purchase of land for the board. The board’s main committees, including finance committee, appointment committee, course committee, and committee of appointment of paper setter and head examiner, are also lying dysfunctional because of absence of the chairman.

The sources said that on retirement of Dr Anwar a summery was moved to the chief secretary by the BISE Sahiwal’s current administration for giving additional charge of the board to BISE Faisalabad Chairman Gulam Muhammad Jhakkar. Another proposal was also forwarded to give the additional charge to Sahiwal Commissioner Baber Hayat.

BISE employees association’s office-bearers said Prof Ikhlaq Hussain (BPS-20) of the Government Postgraduate College can be given additional charge of chairman for handling the affairs of the board and to tackle the financial and administrative crises of the BISE.

Published in Dawn, January 6th, 2017