PESHAWAR: The employees of Peshawar Development Authority (PDA) have refused to work under the newly posted director general, saying he is a BPS-18 officer but has been deployed on a post meant for BPS-20.

The employees have also demanded of the government to withdraw its decision of posting a junior officer on a senior position otherwise they will move court on Monday.

PDA and Local Area Authorities president Abdul Ghafoor told Dawn that employees stopped working as they couldn’t accept the government’s decision to post a junior officer as director general of PDA.

“All employees including officers and engineers will be sitting on the lawns of the PDA building on Monday. No one will be present in the office,” he said. He added that their protest would continue till appointment of an officer in grade-19 or grade-20.

Mr Ghafoor said that three grade-20 officers were working in PDA including a chief engineer and two additional director generals besides 23 directors in grade-19. However, the government posted a grade-18 officer as their boss, he added.

On Thursday, provincial government transferred PDA DG Saqib Raza Aslam, BPS-19, and posted him as secretary of Auqaf, Haj, religious and minorities affairs department. The government posted Mohammad Ali Asghar, BPS-18, who was serving as chief economist in the planning and development department, as director general of PDA.

It is pertinent to mention here that the outgoing DG of PDA was posted on December 10 last year. He remained in the office for 40 days and was transferred without any reasons.

Published in Dawn, January 24th, 2022