Peshawar  -  As an important step to ensure public services delivery in a more efficient and transparent manner in various service delivery outlets of the provincial government, the Caretaker Chief Minister Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Justice (Retd) Syed Arshad Hussain Shah has directed the concerned authorities for taking necessary steps on urgent basis to install live Internet Protocol Cameras (IPCs) at patwar kahanas, police stations and offices of DCs, ACs, DPOs, DSPs and Tehsildars across the province

Presiding over a meeting of the Board of Revenue held at Chief Minister’s House, he further directed to complete installation of IPCs at all aforementioned public service outlets/offices by the end of this month. 

He also directed the concerned high ups to set up a Centralised Monitoring Cell for the surveillance of those cameras and to put in place a mechanism for direct access of the Chief Minister, Chief Secretary and Inspector General of Police offices to those cameras via IP network.

He underlined the need to initiate implementation of this project without any delay and directed the quarter concerned to immediately issue proper directives in written regarding installation of IPCs at all aforementioned offices.

Provincial caretaker Minister for Information Technology Dr Najeeb Ullah, caretaker Minister for Finance and Revenue Ahmed Rasool Bakhsh, Chief Secretary Nadeem Aslam Chaudhry, Additional Chief Secretary Syed Imtiaz Hussain Shah and other relevant officials of the Board of Revenue attended the meeting.

The participants of the meeting reviewed the progress made so far on the digitisation of land records project and discussed various matters related to patwar khanas and other offices of public service delivery.

The Chief Minister directed the quarters concerned to ensure supply of electricity and to install fire extinguishers at Muhafizkhanas across the province.

He further directed them to make the complaint redressal mechanism functional in order to timely address the public grievances regarding revenue affairs. 

The Chief Minister expressed great concerns over unnecessary delay in the completion of land records digitisation project and directed for taking practical steps to complete this important project in all respects by the end of this year.

“No further delay would be tolerable to this effect,” he warned and added that strict action would be taken against the elements found responsible for delaying in this important project. 

The CM said that the poor people were suffering at the hands of the traditional patwar system and this abuse of people will not be tolerated anymore.

“The officials of the Board of Revenue should themselves review the process of providing services to public by visiting the field on regular basis,” he directed and added that all the Deputy Commissioners would also have to visit at least one patwar khana in their respective districts on daily basis.

Similarly, he directed the District Police Officers to ensure visit of at least one police station on daily basis in order to have check and balance on the affairs related to public services.

“It is our collective responsibility to serve the citizens as per their aspirations, for which all the concerned higher officials should spare the time for field visit in order to address the public grievances,” he remarked.

It was decided in the meeting to form a task force headed by the provincial minister for Information Technology for the timely completion of the land records digitization project.

The task force will hold progress review meetings on daily basis and will submit report of the same to the Chief Minister. It was also decided to hold a weekly review meeting to be chaired by the chief minister with the purpose to take a stock of progress on the project.

KP govt decides to make universities self-sufficient

A high-level meeting chaired by Caretaker Chief Minister Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Syed Arshad Hussain Shah on Sunday decided to develop financial plans to make all public sector universities financially self-dependent.The meet ing also decided to activate search committee for appointment of Vice Chancellors. The committee would submit its report within a week to the provincial minister.

The CM emphasised to improve the administrative affairs and governance of the universities to solve the problems being faced by the universities. The Chief Minister asked to promote high standard of higher education based on the demand of market adding that priorities should also be given to quality of research work.

He said the secondary and higher secondary education system should be aligned with the priorities of higher education institutions.

For this purpose, the CM asked to hold consultation with the stakeholders.