LAHORE, Aug 24: As many as 21 officers in BS-19 are working against the BS-20 posts of district coordination officers in the province in the presence of a number of BS-20 officers awaiting posting in the Services and General Administration Department.

Of the 34 districts, only 12 have BS-20 DCOs. "This is a clear violation of the local government law," official sources informed Dawn on Tuesday.

According to the sources, BS-19 officers are working as DCOs in Attock, Bahawalnagar, Bahawalpur, Bhakkar, Chakwal, Faisalabad, Gujranwala, Gujrat, Hafizabad, Jhelum, Jhang, Kasur, Khanewal, Khushab, Mandi Bahauddin, Mianwali, Narowal, Okara, Pakpattan, Rajanpur, Sargodha and Sheikhupura.

Of them six were PCS officers and the remaining DMG officers. The PCS officers were working as DCOs in Attock, Bhakkar, Gujrat, Hafizabad, Pakpattan and Rajanpur, they said.

The sources said a majority of the DMG officers had been promoted to BS-20 against the posts of DCOs. But they had either not been posted as the DCOs or they themselves were not interested in seeking the posting. Similarly, many PCS officers had been promoted to BS-20 over the last two years, but a majority of them had not been posted as the DCOs.

"The government is following the policy of suitability. Besides, a majority BS-20 DMG officers are reluctant to work as DCOs because they find the post lesser charming than the defunct posts of divisional commissioners," the sources said.

They said to accommodate BS-20 officers not posted as DCOs, the government had recently been upgrading posts of BS-19. "This is again wrong because this is depriving the officers of the same grade of their rightful posting in BS-19," they said.