PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Provincial Civil Service Officers Association has expressed serious concern over manhandling and use of force against the employees of various federal and provincial departments who were peacefully protesting for their due rights in Islamabad.

In a statement issued here, the association’s coordinator Fahd Ikram Qazi urged both the federal and provincial governments to refrain from such tactics which multiplied the problems of governance instead of resolving the same.

It said that the employees should be engaged in a meaningful dialogue over their legitimate demands, including increase in salaries keeping in view the inflation, devaluation of rupee and resultant decrease in real terms of the pay and pension besides other management matters.

The statement said that the committee on civil service reforms too had presented superficial proposals after years of deliberations, instead of brining about structural changes in terms of constitutional provisions as per Article 240, ensuring merit and brining parity – if not increase – in salaries/incentives of the government employees.

“We extend all our cooperation to the government in resolving these issues besides extending full support to all the marginalised government employees who are receiving an unfair deal vis-a-vis their services,” the statement said.

Published in Dawn, February 11th, 2021