Role of Ministries/ Divisions:

Rule 25 (2) of the Rules of Business, 1973 states that at the beginning of each financial year, each
Division shall, for the information of the Cabinet and for general public, prepare and upload on its website
as a permanent record a Year Book which shall contain:

a. the details of its activities, achievements and progress during the preceding financial year giving
only the unclassified information which can be used for reference purposes;
b. the program of activities and targets set out for itself during the preceding financial year and the
extent to which they have been realized; and
c. the relevant statistics properly tabulated.

Further Rule 25(3) of the Rules of Business says the Secretary of each Division shall inform the
Cabinet Secretary, within ninety days at the end of the financial year under report, about availability of
the Year Book, who shall disseminate this information to all members of the Cabinet and all Divisions.

Compliance of Rules of Business 1973

The government of Pakistan currently comprises of 33 ministries and 43 divisions 1and each division
encompasses certain executive departments and autonomous bodies. Currently, there are 88 executive
departments2 and 204 autonomous bodies3within federal government structure functioning under 43
divisions. In this regard, the appraisal of 43 division websites reveals the currently there are only National
Security and States and Frontier Regions Divisions which have FY 20-21, year book uploaded on their
websites and majority display till FY-2018-19 or earlier. Although, the purpose of year book is to present
the yearly details of activities, achievements and progress made by divisions in their respective domains
but they hardly follow a standardized report format, targeted benchmarks and progress indicators on
national levels. This creates irreconcilable differences where each entity has its own way of reporting
design and in some instances becomes a tedious task for timely completion at the end of financial year.
The response of federal ministries on such request by a sister Ministry was very poor rather
indifferent. The Cabinet Division has also not performed well, as according to Rule 25(3) of the Rules of

1
Cabinet Division. 2020. “List of Ministries/Divisions.” https://doi.org/27august2021.
2
N.d. Gov.Pk. Accessed August 27, 2021a. http://irc.gov.pk/SiteImage/Downloads/Notified%20Executive%20Department's
%20of%20the%20Federal%20Government-converted.pdf.

3
N.d. Gov.Pk. Accessed August 27, 2021b. http://irc.gov.pk/SiteImage/Downloads/Notified%20Autonomous%20Bodies
%20of%20the%20Federal%20Government-converted.pdf.
Business, it should have knowledge of preparing Year Books by all Ministries/ Division and
dissemination of this to all members of the Cabinet and Divisions.

Non-responsive Behavior of Ministries/ Divisions: The task of getting two-year achievement report
from each of them in present government tenure became tedious due to many factors. The response on the
request of data by DEMP was very lukewarm. The case study discusses the theory of cognitive
dissonance as one of the reasons that make a department or civil servant to avoid sharing the Information.
As sharing their performance would be inconsistent with the believe that civil servants have to serve the
country. There is a very common state of affairs in bureaucracy in which extra work is being avoided
specially in the event when no direct personal benefit is attached with that in the form of career
progression or cash reward.

Themes of Power and Principal-Agent relationship

Case study also discussed two themes one is of Power and other of Principal Agent Theory 4. The power
worked when the secretary requested the minister for a letter from secretary to PM to steer the non-
responsive ministries to send required information. So, instructions from the Top were immediately
complied and information was promptly sent. The case study reflects on power relationship. Departments
move when there is an instruction from above but not in normal course of their work.

Secondly, all the players are working in a circle of Principal-Agent relationship. The DG wants good
PER, the Secretary wants security of tenure, the Minister wants goodwill of PM, the PM wants to show
his performance to his voters for re-election and to downplay the oppositions. So in our environment
things move around these relationships. If there is an absence of this circle, then there is no incentive to
do things just because it is right to do.

Policy and Strategy of Ministry of Information:

Ironically, the study shows that though the Ministries/ Divisions followed the Rules of Business by
preparing Year Book regularly but there is absence of information in Ministry of information as no
attempt was made to acquire the available information from the websites. Ministry has rather made its
own proforma and attempted to get desired info through the typical government way of writing letters and
reminders. Such routine information gathering letters are usually not given priority.

4
Braun, Dietmar, and David H. Guston. "Principal-agent theory and research policy: an introduction." Science and public
policy 30, no. 5 (2003): 302-308.
 The way in which the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting started work on launching a
report on the achievement of government to showcase the performance was not very professional and all
DGs were not involved despite daily coordination meetings. There was no targeted strategy and objectives
were not shared with IPO beforehand to get quick response from RPOs. The DG (DEMP) also started
with non-formal channels of calling her batch mates in relevant ministries to get information. The task
was assigned to DEMP without realizing the institutional capacity of the Directorate or the Ministry itself.
The Ministry of Information or for that matter DEMP’s role in developing such report was not worked
out. It should have been included in the functions of DEMP so that necessary systems could have been
developed on the basis of past experiences. Besides, the DEPM has faced serious constraints in the form
of trained and motivated human resource, office equipment and adequate budget.