BAHAWALPUR, May 19: The Punjab government has been recommended that a law should be enacted to award a seven-year hard jail along with Rs20,000 fine to a convict for submitting a false complaint against anyone to the Anti-Corruption Establishment.

This was disclosed by Punjab ACE director-general Brig Muhammad Aslam Ghumman (retired) while talking to newsmen here on Wednesday. The director-general said the false complainant 'mafia' had become a headache for the department. Therefore, to discourage them, he said the government had been approached to take legal remedy in this matter.

He said, in future, no complaint would be entertained without complainants' national identity cards. During the last eight months, he said, at least 317 gazetted, 6,300 non-gazetted government officials were convicted in corruption cases in the Punjab while another 3,000 government officials were under-trial in similar cases in different courts.

Besides, he said, around 6,000 inquiries in corruption cases against government officials were going on in the Punjab. He said the network of the ACE would be expanded up to the district level in the near future.

He said a complaint cell had been established in each district for the convenience of genuine complainants. The corrupt ACE officials would be dealt with severely while honest officials would be rewarded, he added.

BUS SERVICE: The Daewoo management has announced launching of its bus service from Bahawalpur to the up-country from Friday (tomorrow). Talking to newsmen here on Wednesday, Daewoo general manager Sohail Ahmed and Bahawalpur terminal incharge Jahanbaz said that buses would be plied from Bahawalpur to Rawalpindi, (via Multan, Jhang), to Lahore (via Khanewal, Sahiwal) and to Faisalabad (via Multan, Jhang).