Tazeen Akhtar
Ministries of Information in Pakistan , either federal or provincial, have always been taken as the hubs of corruption in the name of media management. The Federal Ministry is the most discussed ministry for wrong doings, nepotism, unjustified distribution of advertisement, obliging favorites and looting state funds that the state provides for image building of the government.
Pakistan Television is among the most exploited departments of the Ministry where all types of corruption, financial and “other” is always talk of the town.
Such a matter surfaced at the Standing Committee on Information and Broadcasting meeting today at PEMRA under the chairmanship of Mr. Pullain Baloch, MNA when the Information Minister tried to get approval of 10 disputed projects of his ministry that were never discussed or brought up in the committee.
He was supposed to present 14 Projects but he presented 17 and 10 were new. Sehar Kamran pointed out this irregularity and asked about the previous questions that were never answered by the minister information including his business plan at PTV and his posting of the husband of an MNA as Human Resources Manager at Pakistan Television.
Federal Secretary Ashfaq Khalil and Chairperson PEMRA Ambreen Jaan were also present in the meeting. The minister and secretary , both did not bother to stop Sehar and remained indifferent.
Ambreen Jaan tried to convince Sehar not to leave but Sehar asked her, ” A minister can shout at the senator in the meeting?
Standing Committee asked the PEMRA to strengthen its regulatory mechanism for better regulation of electronic media. The Committee also asked the Ministry to take up the issue of payment of salaries to media workers with the media outlets.
The Committee suggested for strict implementation of Code of Conduct for airing dramas and advertisements on TV Channels conforming the same with the social and religious norms. The Committee also asked the Ministry to link th clearance of dues of media outlets with timely payment of salaries of media workers.
Here it is worth mentioning that Ambreen Jaan was posted Chairperson of PEMRA out of the way soon after her retirement as federal secretary of the ministry, that is clearly a favoritism. There is no lack of officers in gov of Pakistan rather it is bitter reality that the number of bureacracy exceeds the limit becoming unbearable burden on public exchequour.
At another department of the same ministry , Associated Press of Pakistan , the state news agency , a very strange matter emerged when the joint secretary of the ministry conveyed verbally the message of federal secretary Ashfaq Khalil , that again verbal to leave the seat. Why was the secretary not able to issue a notification in this regard? He , himself, had a fault in this regard? that he wanted to cover?
APP itself has been exploited cruelly by the ministers and others for getting their favorite posted in this news agency just for the sake of salaries.
This state news agency costs 2 billion Rs to this poor nation annually and the performance can be seen in a survey with the common public where no one knows about what APP is.
This bad state of affairs at the ministry of information needs urgent attention of the Prime Minister.
The meeting was attended by, Mr. Attaullah Tarar, Minister for Information and Broadcasting, MNAs; Mr. Saad Waseem, Mr. Nadeem Abbas, Ms. Asia Naz Tanoli, Ms. Romina Khurshid Alam, Ms. Kiran Haider, Ms. Shaheen, Ms. Sehar Kamran, Syed Amin Ul Haque, Ms. Rana Ansar, Molana Abdul Ghafoor Haideri (through Zoom), Ms. Kiran Imran Dar (through Zoom) Secretary, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Chairperson PEMRA and other officers of departments under the Ministry and the PEMRA.
