LAHORE, Nov 6: The Punjab accountant-general directed on Wednesday to stop payment including that for the utility bills of all those departments failing to get 100 per cent verification of their expenditures of the current and the previous financial years by Nov 15.

He made it clear that salaries of those DDOs failing to get their accounts and expenditure verified by Nov 15 would also be stopped.

The decisions were taken during a review committee meeting which was presided over by Accountant-General Wazir Ahmad Qureshi and attended by senior officers of his office here.

Mr Qureshi said his office had already conveyed the decision to all provincial government departments and district account offices.

The AG regretted that despite repeated instructions and reminders by the AG office, the provincial finance minister and the secretary, heads and administrative secretaries of all government departments never showed interest in getting their expenditure of the previous and the current financial years verified.

This had left no choice but to withhold the non-obliging departments’ bills including that of water, power and telephone, he said.

He said permanent verification of the monthly accounts of the district governments was the responsibility of every DDO. The AG office had been continuously drawing the attention of the principal accounting officers and the DDOs towards this requirement but they forgot their duty.

The AG said these offices did not also follow the instructions by their own departments in this connection and therefore it had been decided to stop their salaries after the expiry of the grace period of Nov 15. The salaries would be paid only after 100 per cent verification of the accounts, he said.