Bengali says he opposed downsizing idea by sacking employees – Pakistan

ISLAMABAD: Leading economist Dr Kaiser Bengali disclosed, Friday, that he had proposed abolishing 60 entities/ attached departments of 15 ministries/divisions at federal levels to save Rs35 billion per annum.

During an interaction with media at National Press Club Islamabad here on Friday, he said that he had never supported any idea through downsizing by sacking employees but recommended curtailing non-salaried expenditures like closing down offices, saving electricity and fuel bills etc.

Dr Kaiser Bengali said that he preferred to resign from the government’s austerity/right-sizing committee when the government presented a report to the prime minister without getting the assent of committee, whereby, recommending abolishing of 150,000 vacant posts of lower grades from 1 to 15.

However, the government refused to abolish posts belonged to Grade 20 to 22 such as Federal Secretaries, Additional Secretaries and Director Generals (DGs).

He proposed closing down of nine divisions including Aviation, Capital Administration and Development, Housing and Works, Human Rights, National Food Security and Research, Overseas Pakistanis and Human Resource Development, Poverty Alleviation and Social Security and States and Frontier Region. He proposed merging Maritime Division with Communication Division, Railways with Communication Division, Defence Production with Defence Division, National Security Division with Defence Division, Narcotics with Interior Division, Economic Affairs Division with Finance Division and Revenue Division with Finance Division.

He recommended merging three divisions including Federal Education and Professional Training, Overseas Pakistanis and Human Resource Development and Poverty Alleviation and Social Security into new Division called Human Development.

He mentioned names of 60 entities/attached departments of respective ministries/division for closing down and their non-salaried expenditures could save Rs35 billion. If the salaried component included then the saving could go up to Rs100 billion.

Dr Kaiser Bengali added that “Our biggest expense comes in the form of diesel costs for freight delivery, which can be eliminated by enabling railways as it could reduce the cost in the range of 15 to 17 per cent.”