26 July 2005
Two years back I filed a complaint about my home telephone on PTCL Main On Line Complaint Center. I was then working abroad. Next day I checked On Line status which told me phone was OK whereas the phone still was not working. Each time I made a new complaint the following day the One Line showed me fault having been removed on the next day of my filing the very first complaint. During all these days I contacted my family through neighbours. Finally I used a personal link and phone was within two hours restored. I filed a complaint with Federal Ombudsman requesting line rent refund for 10-11 days phoned remained out of order. In developed countries the more serious would had been falsely feeding and showing the status as OK rather than line refund. The Ombudsman asked me to first write to PTCL which I did. Immediately came PTCL staff to my home creating harassment as it demanded immediately signing a satisfactory report that phone was working OK and there was no complaint. The family had to contact me abroad immediately from the nearest PCO advising me not to follow up complaint any further. Hence later I did not revert to Ombudsman. This showing of back dated efficiencies is not restricted merely to PTCL.
In October 2004 I applied for NCIOP. On a huge expense an On Line Enquiry Status programme has been set up by NADRA. After initial 2-3 months I kept on visiting On Line to know the status when I always found my particulars, my date of application, name of Pakistani Mission abroad through which my application was received. On Dispatch Information column I always found entries showing name of Embassy, Box No. with some numerical digits in it and Dispatch Date entry always empty which meant Card was not dispatched till that date of my enquiry. For one example, I visited On Line on 10/2/2005 still dispatch date entry was blank. In this period I thrice visited the Embassy to find that the Card had not come from Islamabad. Now when I visited On Line this week I could not believe my eyes it showed “Consignment Date” as of November 2004. This means having dispatched the card in November 2004 whereas only till May 2005 NDARA On Line showed this date blank. This is back dated efficiency and in fact most of the Government Departments are misguiding the Government and fooling the nation showing such false efficiencies. Perhaps it could be one of the reason that Their Excellencies the President and the Prime Minister who really are very concerned and keen to remove poverty on grass toot level do believe that common man’s poverty was decreasing and press was just unnecessary crying. Of course this is because Their Excellencies are to depend on such back dated efficiencies.