Punjab Ombudsman buys expensive phones worth Rs. 76 lacs, govt denies any involvement

An official notification of a “sale tax invoice” from the Punjab Ombudsman placing an order of five Samsung Galaxy S24 and seven iPhone Pro Max worth Rs. 76 lacs created a stir on social media. Netizens criticised the government for wasting money, but the government claimed otherwise.

A number of X (formerly Twitter) users criticised the government for spending extravagantly on such accessories. Journalist and academic Ali Moeen Nwazish posted on X: “This is exactly why people don’t pay tax in Pakistan. If you want people to pay tax, show that it is being spent on people like their healthcare and education, and not on land cruisers, iPhones, servants, luxuries and plots for the elite bureaucrats, judges and military officers.”

Another user named Osama Yawar shared the notification with the caption, “Is this how taxpayers money is being wasted by officials who can’t even write an email?”

To put more fuel to the fire, a citizen named Sohaib Qureshi, claiming to be an expert on E-Commerce, shared that the company The Laptop Store, with which the Ombudsman has placed an order, is allegedly non-filer. To prove his claim, Sohaib attached a screenshot from the FBR website where the company has no record of tax to its name. “More than one million is a sales tax but this laptop store is non compliant in sales tax,” Sohaib wrote.

Punjab’s Information Minister Azma Bukhari told The Current that Punjab’s Ombudsman is an autonomous body and does not come under Punjab government, “It’s from an autonomous body, not by Punjab government,” she said.

However, the Punjab Ombudsman was reluctant to respond to our request for confirmation of the viral notification. Even after multiple calls, there was no explicit answer, but an inside source revealed that this is a normal process and it seems authentic as it has the signature of the accounts officer of Punjab’s Ombudsman. The same source elaborated that the Punjab Ombudsman has its own budget and works independently. The phones are not for personal use but for official use only.

An account titled Jmhoori Martial Law asked people to explain the difference between Iphone 15 pro max with 512 GB and Samsaung Galaxy with the same storage. “Other Pakistani brands available in Pakistan, do they have better capability to record videos?” the handle asked.

The Ombudsman office is empowered to entertain complaints against any department commission or office of the Provincial Government or a statutory corporation or other institution established or controlled by the Provincial Government but does not include the High Court and the Courts working under the supervision of High Court and Provincial Assembly and its Secretariat, explains the official website as its primary function.