KARACHI, Oct 7: The office of the Sindh Ombudsman solved as many as 277 cases during September through informal procedures under the Section 33 of the Ombudsman Act 1992, while 160 cases were decided through formal regular hearings in the month.

The media manager of the Ombudsman Secretariat, Sindh, Hassan Rizvi, told Dawn that some 325 complaints had been received by the head office and 60 of them were decided on merit.

According to statistics, the ombudsman offices across the province received 640 complaints out of which 262 were admitted and 160 were decided and the rest of them were either rejected or sent to the relevant authorities.

Most of the complaints, he said, were against the police, irrigation, education and health departments. He said the cases had been decided within 15 days without even hiring legal counsels.

The Ombudsman Secretariat also has regional offices in Karachi Central, Karachi East, Hyderabad, Mirpurkhas, Nawabshah, Naushero Feroz, Larkana, Sukkur, Badin and Dadu.

Mr Rizvi said that all the regional directors had been authorised to probe into the cases and take the decision and to intimate the head office about the progress and problems if any.

He said that the number of complaints being solved under Section 33 had been maintained only for record, but the details of complaints had not been recorded.

According to the registrar of the Sindh Ombudsman, Masood Ishrat, minor complaints such as admissions to educational institutions, pay or pension, utility bills, delay in paper work of GP fund, etc were resolved under the Section 33 of the Ombudsman Act.

Around 99 per cent of such minor problems were solved through the telephonic discussions with the officials concerned, he said, adding that this method had been initiated by the Ombudsman, Yousuf Jamal, for quick disposal of cases.