GUJRAT: The district administration that has already been trying to have the posting of regular officers on key vacant seats, is now short of two more officials -- a settlement officer and an assistant commissioner.

Gujrat Settlement Officer Ilyas Gill, a grade-19 officer of the PCS, has been posted to Gujranwala as anti-corruption establishment director while AC (headquarters) Majid Bin Ahmed holding the additional charge of Additional Deputy Commissioner General (ADCG), is Piplan (Mianwali) AC now.

Both Mr. Gill and Mr. Ahmed have relinquished the charge.

The charge of Gujrat deputy commissioner is currently being held by Mandi Bahauddin DC Muzaffar Sial following transfer and posting of Liaquat Ali Chatha to Sargodha as DC whereas the office of the Gujrat additional deputy commissioner (revenue) has also become ‘dysfunctional’ after Irfan Ali Kathia joined a course for promotion at National Institute of Public Administration, Lahore.

Mr. Kathia has not yet relinquished the charge of ADC (R) but he is not available at his seat.

Apart from these two senior most posts, Gujrat ADC (finance and planning) Saadia Mehar has been on leave for around a month which may continue for a few weeks more whereas District Monitoring Officer (DMO) Waqar Khan is suffering from some ailment and attending office off and on.

The transfer of Settlement Officer Mr. Gill is causing problems for litigants engaged in cases related to land revenue department as the SO is an appellant authority and hear cases against the decisions of tehsildars (revenue officers) and assistant commissioners. No one has been given the task so far.

Though Mr Sial is holding the additional charge of the DC and he has visited Gujrat thrice during the last eight days, at present no senior official is available in the district. The officer available at the district headquarters is Gujrat AC Zaheer Abbas Chatha who is naturally overburdened, particularly attending video link conferences with the senior hierarchy at divisional and provincial headquarters besides doing his own official work.

Similarly, the district police has been awaiting posting of headquarters and investigation SPs for the last seven months.

Published in Dawn, March 10th, 2017