HYDERABAD, Dec 8: The district council demanded on Saturday that the federal government should give Baitul Maal department under the control of district government so that it could ensure distribution of aid among the deserving and the needy in a fair and transparent manner.

The demand was raised through a resolution tabled by Rozina Fasahat, who expressed concern over unfair distribution of Baitul Maal funds. She alleged that that the funds never reached the deserving people in majority of cases and people were made to shuttle between the offices of union council nazims and district council members.

Q. Mohammad Hakim called for giving Baitul Mal department under the control of district government, which would ensure transparency in the distribution of funds through monitoring of the department.

The council adopted the resolution with recommendations put forwarded by the two members.

Mr Hakim said that decentralization of powers was a good idea that was being adopted in every part of the world but unfortunately people here not supportive of the system. The federal government should directly transfer Baitul Maal funds to union councils’ accounts, he suggested.

Hussain Bux Hussaini said that nazims were always given forms, which were then sent to Baitul Maal department still the deserving people failed to get financial aid because the officials concerned always misguided them. “Political considerations were always given preference in the distribution of payment of funds,” he said and added that people whose integrity was beyond doubt should be posted in the department.

Rashid Khan proposed that the resolution should be adopted with recommendations and sent to the federal government while Yamin Soomro said that applications always went missing in DCO office while the officers did not behave decently with the applicants.

In another resolution on educational institutions’ infrastructure Rozina Fasahat specifically mentioned Tandojam High School which faced shortage of teaching staff.

Q. Mohammad Hakim, the focal person of district government on education, quoted some facts and figures to defend the district government and argued that the district had allocated Rs2,100 million for the sector and Rs30 million were being spent on the improvement of infrastructure in schools.

“District government is committed to the revival of quality education in Hyderabad for which it is working,” he said.

He referred to conversion of 110 Urdu medium schools into English medium by district government and said that the district government had held headmasters conference to build their confidence and raise their morale.

Mehboob Abro accused the district government of overspending and said that the district government had just changed the name of school from Urdu medium to English medium while the schools’ environment remained to be changed.