Even after the lapse of three months, the Ministry of Finance has not yet approved the summary moved by the Ministry of Law and Justice to increase the salaries of attorney general, deputy attorney general and standing counsels by more than 100 per cent.
Sources informed TheNation that the Law Ministry had submitted a draft summary, about three months ago, seeking the Finance Ministry’s permission to increase the salary package for attorney general, deputy attorney general and standing counsels.
They further said that the country had suffered colossal loss in the recent floods, adding that according to the World Bank and Asian Development Bank report on Disaster Need Assessment, Pakistan suffered $10.5 billion loss due to the recent floods.
In that scenario, it had become difficult for the Finance Ministry to give 100 per cent raise in the salaries of the legal counsels, they added.
Sources maintained that the ministry had proposed a salary package amounting to Rs500,000 per month for attorney general, who is presently getting around Rs200,000. Similarly, the deputy attorney general would get a salary package of Rs250,000 who is currently receiving around Rs150,000.
Moreover, the senior official said the salary package for standing counsel and federal counsel is also being doubled. He said the standing counsel would be offered Rs175, 000 whereas the federal counsel would receive Rs100,000 per month under the new proposal. Presently, the official said, the standing counsel gets a package of around Rs75, 000 to Rs100,000 whereas the federal counsel gets an amount of Rs50,000.
A Law Ministry official told that the move was aimed at ‘morale boosting’ for the legal team.
It has been learnt that the Government, due to paucity of funds, did not hire the services of eminent lawyers to defend it in the 18th Amendment before the 17-member larger bench of the Supreme Court.
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