The president appointed all four retired officers as members of the FPSC after exercising the powers conferred under article 242 (IA) of the Constitution and under sub-section (3) of section 3 of FPSC Ordinance, 1977, as amended from time to time.
According to documents , the FPSC wrote a letter to the Establishment Division on October 11 and requested to provide a brief bio-data and last posting in grade-22 along with the date of retirement of eight officers Abid Saeed, Muhammad Shahzad Arbab, Haseeb Athar, Khizar Hayat Gondal, Amjad Ali Khan, Raza Seerat, Khalid Saeed and Kamran Ali Qureshi. The information had been sought for processing the proposed names to the prime minister for final selection as FPSC members.
A former bureaucrat criticized the appointment process of the FPSC member saying the government posted its blue-eyed retired officers as members. He said that the government should have appointed the members on merit because the commission’s prime responsibility was related to the CSS examination and appointments on key positions.
On Wednesday, the federal government approved the premature retirement of Asif, however, he has also applied the leave preparatory to retirement (LPR) a few days back.
According to the notification issued by Establishment Division, “the competent authority has been pleased to accord approval to the request of premature retirement of Mr. Nadeem Hassan Asif, a BS-22 officer of Secretariat Group, presently posted as Secretary Cabinet Division with immediate effect.” The Islamabad High Court on Tuesday issued notices to the Federation and others on a petition challenging the appointment of four members of the Federal Public Service Commission.
IHC judge Aamer Farooq took up the petition and directed the Federation, the Accountant General Pakistan Revenues (AGPR) and the newly appointed four members of FPSC to submit their replies.
The petitioner, Naeem, through his counsel Junaid Akhtar had mad the Federation through the secretary Establishment Division, the secretary FPSC, four members of FPSC, Nadeem Hassan Asif, Haseeb Akhtar, Abid Saeed and Zubair Mehmood and the AGPR as respondents.
The petitioner has prayed to the court to declare the appointment of the four FPSC members as illegal, unlawful, violative of the FPSC Ordinance 1977 and Regulations 1978.
He has also requested the court to direct the secretary Establishment Division and the secretary FPSC to strictly adhere to the provision of FPSC Ordinance 1977 and Regulations.
He has further prayed to the court to restrain the FPSC members from discharging any official duty till the disposal of the petition. The petitioner has stated that as per the provisions of the law and regulations, of the total 11 vacancies for FPSC members, six vacancies are required to be filled by persons having held the office in the service in the PBS-21 or above and one vacancy was reserved for a retired officer of armed forces.
However, the petitioner said that the quota prescribed for a retired judge of the superior judiciary, a woman and a person from private sector having requisite qualification have been intentionally not filled with appropriate eligible persons malafidely in order to appoint the blue-eyed retired officers of civil service against the provision of the law.
He has contended that their appointment was against the relevant laws and regulations as the prescribed quota for retired bureaucrats had already been exhausted and they were not eligible for such an appointment against the other prescribed quota.
