The outgoing secretary Planning Commission Ashraf Hayat is said to have approved a controversial project costing Rs 51 million for Hunnar Foundation, a Non Governmental Organisation (NGO), financed from Public Sector Development Program (PSDP) at a time when the government was compelled to drop projects worth billions of rupees due to financial constraints, Business Recorder has learnt.
In defiance of its mandate, a Planning Commission official was to implement the project and, contrary to technical requirements, the PC-I for Hunnar Foundation failed to provide a detailed break-up of its cost as well as the required qualification and experience of employees, principal, instructors, accountants etc. In addition the post of Lab Assistant and Lab Attendant was not mentioned in the PC-I.
The detail of proposed training and break-up of training cost, procedure of selection, required qualification etc was also missing in the PC-I. The course duration at Hunnar Foundation was mentioned as 12 months while a detailed annexure gave the time line as 14 months.
The Hunnar project includes the establishment of technical institutes at Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad, with 16.2 million rupees earmarked to be spent on employee related expenditures, Rs 15 million on training of Masters Trainees and Rs 20 million as a revolving fund. Sources maintain that Departmental Developmental Working Party (DDWP) headed by Ashraf Hayat had approved the project despite several technical faults in PC-1 submitted to Planning Commission. Secretary Planning Commission was earlier accused of approving a project for Fazal Memorial Welfare Society reportedly run by his close relative at a cost of Rs 3.7 million.