PTA, FIA officials involved in grey trafficking: Senate panel says...

The Senate Standing Committee on Information Technology on Friday alleged that the officials of Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) and Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) are involved in grey traffic in the country. The Senate body met here in the Parliament House under the chairmanship of Muhammad Idrees Khan Safi. Members of the committee were Syed Faisal Raza Abidi, Mrs Farhat Abbas, Muhammad Zahid Khan, Mrs Fouzia Fakhar-uz-Zaman and Salim Saifullah Khan.
The committee said every year country loose revenue of 300 million dollar national exchequer because of illegal grey traffic. The committee members said that grey trafficking is a major source of theft causing millions of dollars loss to the national exchequer.
The committee members pointed out that laws related to barring grey trafficking need to be further strengthened. The committee directed the PTA to improve its monitoring mechanism also so that persons or groups involved in grey trafficking may not go unchecked.
The committee also took serious notice of the objectionable SMS messages and directed PTA to establish a mechanism to stop these dirty messages. Senator Faisal Raza Abidi said that he would disclose all the details in the press conference if Chairman PTA failed to provide details of agreement between PTCL and Holly Well (Pvt Company) before the committee in the next meeting of the committee.
Chairman PTA briefed the committee about grey trafficking issue and the SIM registration besides problems in the identification of IMEI number of different mobile sets of the same brand. The committee also summoned Director General FIA and cellular companies in the next meeting of the committee. The next meeting would be held on October 21.