The government has referred cases against more than 2,000 government employees to the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) so that action may be taken against their illegal actions of benefiting from the Benazir Income Support Programme (BISP). This was revealed by Special Assistant to Prime Minister (SAPM) on Accountability Shahzad Akbar during a press conference in Islamabad on Wednesday. As many as 554 officers or their spouses benefited from the programme in Balochistan, 342 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 101 in Punjab and 938 in Sindh. A total of 39 employees of grade 1 to 16 and four officers of grade 17 and above who worked for BISP itself benefited from the programme; they have now been fired. Digital payment mechanism with bio-metric verification is in place now for the BISP beneficiaries that will reduce the chances of identity theft and fraudulent withdrawals.

Source: Pakistan Today January 29, 2020 17:03 UTC