ISLAMABAD, Dec 14 (APP): Federal Minister for Planning, Development and Special Initiatives Professor Ahsan Iqbal on Wednesday directed the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) and the provincial governments to ensure the effective coordination for the timely completion of the country’s first-ever Digital Census, and 7th Population and Housing Census-2022.

The Minister made these directions while chairing the fourth meeting of Census Monitoring Committee (CMC) to review the progress made so far, said a press release issued here.

The meeting was attended by the chief secretaries of all the provinces/ regions with relevant secretaries, additional commissioner Islamabad, DG Military Operations, Directorate, representatives from NADRA, NTC, special secretary Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP), DG Higher Education Commission (HEC), and senior officers from education, local government and other relevant stakeholders.

“The government is spending Rs 34 billion for the country’s first-ever digital census and each penny is public money which must be utilized to maximize the expenditures,” said the minister, while directing the PBS to share the details of the procurement purchased for the census.

The minister also inquired about the procurement of the last census and its usage, and asked the provincial governments to attach their officials with the PBS in a week so the process of census could be expedited.

He also asked the provincial governments to impose a ban on the transfer of officials, who have been deputed for census, till the completion of the census. It is noted that officials from the education department and others were attached with the PBS for the census.

The PBS’ chief statistician gave a brief overview of the agenda of the fourth CMC meeting. The main agenda of the meeting was to devise the mechanism for the appropriate and timely resolution of the issues regarding the census operations i.e. provision of staff, provision of ToT and TOE Venue for the training at the division and tehsil levels, and non-joining of provisional census commission from provincial governments.

He informed that the Council of Common Interest (CCI) had directed to conduct the digital census using modern digital technology and the PBS initiated the preparations and for provision of 12,6000 tablets and Census ERP, the PBS signed an agreement with NADRA on June 20 for preparation of a comprehensive digital solution for carrying out the first-ever digital census in the country.

He shared the overall progress of the census activities and informed that the PBS, with support of all relevant stakeholders, had completed major tasks and now prepared for the full rollout of the gigantic task of census.

Furthermore, he added, the PBS initiated training of the digital census in three tiers i.e. training of master trainers, training of trainers (ToT), and training of enumerators. He also discussed the main issues that were being faced by the PBS due to non-willing of joining by the provisional government for conduct of digital census and non-availability of ToT venues at the district and tehsil levels.

The minister emphasized on the timely completion of census and asked the provisional government to nominate the officers on attachment bases during the census tenure, and to immediately provide the training venues along with required facilities to make the training session more effective.

Moreover, the minister said that whatever information the ECP was requiring before officially handing over the digital census on April 30,2023, the PBS would continue sharing that, so that the commission would complete its homework before the start of the delimitation.