KARACHI: Amid administrative chaos in Islamabad, authorities at the Ministry of National Health Services (NHS) are attempting for the second time to get rid of a senior officer of the Drug Regulatory Authority of Pakistan (DRAP) on trumped-up charges, it emerged on Sunday.

Dr Obaid Ali, a grade-18 civil servant who is a deputy director of DRAP, is currently facing an official inquiry for availing leaves allegedly without obtaining permission. He had faced a same inquiry and was dismissed from services in January 2020, but later restored by Prime Minister Imran Khan.

According to an April 2021 notification issued by the NHS ministry, with the approval of the prime minister being the appellate authority, the major penalty of dismissal from service imposed on Dr Ali, former deputy director DRAP, vide ministry’s notification dated Jan 10, 2020, was set aside and he was reinstated with immediate effect.

However, considering his reinstatement as a threat, certain top officials of the health ministry in alleged connivance with a top bureaucrat sitting until last week at the Prime Minister Office started plotting against him and managed to get the same inquiry reopened in August 2021.

Calling it a de novo inquiry, the charge sheet issued to Dr Ali states that he had obtained 11 days casual leaves in 2018, but joined the office after 107 days that too without any permission.

Dr Ali had time and again refuted the allegation with documentary evidence and replied that during the period in question, he was suspended from service and there was no office for him to mark his attendance.

But, the de novo inquiry moved forward and on Monday (today) he’s been summoned to Islamabad for a hearing before the secretary.

At a time when there is no government or even the fully fledged prime minister or health minister, the timing of the final notice left a big question mark on the intentions of the bureaucrats running the show.

It is suspected that the bureaucrats want to take an adverse action before the formation of the new government in a bid to take decisions of their choice in DRAP in his absence and leave him at the mercy of courts and the new government which would obviously take months to decide.

However, despite attempts, NHS ministry federal secretary Amir Ashraf Khwaja was not available for comments.

Karachi-based Dr Ali is known to have highlighted several incidences of malpractice and corruption as he had approached the Supreme Court and the prime minister on exorbitant medicine and transfer pricing by pharmaceutical companies in connivance with DRAP officials.

In February 2018, the NHS ministry had accepted the resignation of his wife, Roohi Bano Obaid, also a deputy director in DRAP, instead of paying any heed towards her frequent highlighting of the alleged corrupt practices prevalent in DRAP.

Published in Dawn, April 11th, 2022