KARACHI, May 11: Many seamen registered with the Pakistan National Shipping Corporation alleged that the PNSC was not selecting seamen on merit and demanded that prescribed procedure be adopted.

Responding to the allegations, the PNSC on Friday claimed that it was following the prescribed procedure while sending the crew to the ships. There are over 1,400 seamen registered with the PNSC roster. At any given time there are approximately 250 seamen jobs on the 14 PNSC ships. After a seaman completes his eight or ninth month on-ship job, he has to wait for his turn that usually comes after 24 to 30 months. The salary of seamen ranges between Rs15,000 and Rs30,000.

Seamen have alleged that though the retirement age was 60 years the PNSC was not sending those aged over 50 years to the ships. The seamen registered with the PNSC were not being sent on seniority basis but favourites and even outsiders were being given opportunities depriving the seamen of the job on their turn.

They said six categories (posts) of seamen had been abolished and one post of an officer offering a monthly salary of around Rs80,000 had been created. They demanded that the seamen aged over 50 years, on their turn, be also sent to ship and the jobs that had been abolished be restored.

Responding to Dawn queries, PNSC representative Illyas Mustafa said that list of vacancies was placed on notice board and seamen applied for the posts on seniority basis. Under the set procedure, the applicants after being interviewed underwent medical test. The seamen were sent to ship only if they could clear the interview and the medical test.

However, if the seamen could not clear the interview or fitness test others on the seniority list were sent to ships. If all those on the seniority list failed to clear the tests, outsiders who passed both tests were sent on the ship.

He said though retirement age was 60 years the job of a seaman on high seas was challenging and required extreme physically fitness. Keeping in view the job requirement, only physically fit people were selected, he added.

He said the posts of pantry man, general steward, utility hand, greaser, Qusab, chief steward had been abolished a long time back, as the ships had been modernised and less crew members were required. He maintained that the newly created post of an officer was not their replacement but altogether a different job.

Meanwhile, the Pakistan Seamen Union (CBA) chief Adam Panjeri said that the union had approached the PNSC chief through many letters but the PNSC chairman had not responded yet. He said though the salaries were slightly raised a couple of times in the past many years, the union wanted to discuss the issue. He pointed out that the arrears under the charter of demand had not been given.He said the interview process of PNSC registered seamen – who had served on PNSC ships many times in past was just an eyewash as the deserving senior seamen were filtered out and favourites who could pay the bribe were selected. He said those who had never served on tankers were interviewing the seamen for jobs on tankers.