ISLAMABAD, Pakistan: As many as 118,798 enumerators and supervisors had been appointed to conduct 6th population census operations across the country from March 15, the National Assembly Standing Committee on Finance was informed.
In the meeting of the Committee which met with Qaiser Ahmad Sheikh in the Chair in Islamabad on Tuesday, it was also informed that an army personnel would accompany each enumerator. The army men would perform security duty as well as monitoring to ensure collection of authentic, credible and transparent data.
Briefing the Committee, the Chief Statistician of the Pakistan Bureau of Statistic (PBS) Asif Bajwa said the country had been divided into 186,120 census blocks of 200 to 250 houses each.
Asif Bajwa said census would be conducted in two phases. It would be started simultaneously in all the provinces and one enumerator would cover two blocks, he added.
The PBS Chief Statistician said two types of forms would be used and training of enumerators was underway. Some 42 per cent work about census in rural areas had been completed, he added.
The Committee members expressed their dismay over the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) Governor, and presidents of National Bank of Pakistan (NBP) and Zarai Taraqiati Bank Limited (ZTBL) for not attending the meeting.
The Committee was briefed by the representatives of ZTBL, NBP and SBP on the reasons for charging high mark-up rates on agriculture loans.
The ZTBL representative told the committee that the bank was charging 8.5 percent as its administrative expenditure.
The Committee expressed its concern on the high mark-up rates charged by the ZTBL and recommended that the single digit markup rate should be charged on agri loans.
Members of National Assembly (MNAs) Saeed Ahmed Khan Manais, Muhammad Pervaiz Malik, Mohsin Shah Nawaz Ranjha, Dr. Shizra Mansab Ali Khan Kharral, Mian Abdul Mannan, Ms. Shiza Fatima Khawaja, Ms. Leila Khan, Dr. Nafisa Shah, Syed Mustafa Mehmud, Asad Umar, Abdul Rashid Godil and Muahmmad Ali Rashid attended the meeting.
Senior officers of the ministries of Finance, Revenue, Economic Affairs, Privatization and Statistics, Federal Board of Revenue (FBR), SBP, NBP and ZTBL attended the meeting.
