ISLAMABAD, Nov 23: Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani has approved autonomous status for Pakistan Academy of Letters (PAL) and a formal notification to this effect will be issued in due course of time.

This was disclosed by PAL Chairman Fakhar Zaman while talking to Dawn on Sunday. He said he would seek interference of President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Gilani to ensure issuance of a notification at the earliest, without any resistance from the bureaucracy.

He said he would also seek a minimum of four time increase in the budget of the academy. He said the budget of Rs50 million was not enough to meet requirements for promotion of literature in the country, as 65 per cent of it was spent on salaries.

He said he would request the president and the prime minister to take it as a special case, despite the economic crunch facing the country.

Answering a question, he said a feasibility report for launching the first-ever literary TV channel and FM radio was being prepared. He said it would be the third literary channel in the world, after French and BBC literary channel. He expressed the confidence that the proposed channel would be a popular channel that would work to project literature by providing extensive coverage to a wide range of literary events and seminars and present reviews on books. He said the literary channel and radio station would be established on the premises of PAL.

He said the academy was not considering buying time on PTV or some private TV channel for its programmes as it wanted to have a dedicated channel for it.

Responding to another question, he said the under-construction Faiz Ahmed Faiz auditorium would be completed by March 31 and said it would become a hub of literary activities soon after its completion.

Fakhar Zaman said he would directly report to the president and prime minister and there would be no via media. “There will be no involvement of the Ministry of Education and the bureaucracy and things will be directly routed to the president and the prime minister.

He said he had high and ambitious targets which generally did not inspire bureaucrats. “Such decisions are taken by the people who have a political and literary background,” he remarked.

He said the PAL would establish linkages with United States, United Kingdom, Turkey, Russia, Central Asian Republics, Poland, Japan, India and all other countries where Urdu was taught.

He said the work for arranging international conference on mysticism had been initiated. He recalled that the first international writers conference organised by him during his first stint as PAL chairman was attended by 400 high profile literary icons from 110 countries of the world.

Fakhar Zaman, who is also the chairman of World Punjabi Congress (WPC), said he would ensure that his new assignment did not affect the WPC programmes.