ISLAMABAD- The regular, permanent employees of the Capital Development Authority (CDA) have upped the ante in their struggle against the contract employees who have been inducted into the Authority at high salaries. According to the regulars, the current financial crunch in the government makes stronger their old case of getting rid of the lateral entries in the civic body. In particular, they are rallying against contract employees working in the CDA's Treasury, in the Project Management Office (PMO) and seven Project Directors who have been hired for the execution of various mega projects in the capital city. They are persuading their high-ups and journalists visiting the Authority's headquarters on the plea that scores of contract employees appointed on hefty packages are a burden on the depleting kitty of the civic body. They also wail over their low salaries and claim that they are able to supervise the various projects for which special Project Directors have been hired during former CDA Chairman Kamran Lashari's era. On the other hand, contract employees argue that they were inducted in the Authority as its regular employees had no knowledge and skill required for execution of mega projects like Zero Point, F-9 Park and Convention and Cultural Complex etc. We have materialized projects pending for the decades, said a project director, adding that a single project they were supervising was worth the total budget of the Authority in past. He said that Project Directors were employed in CDA under the directives of Planning Commission, which says that an independent Project Director should be hired for execution of projects worth more than Rs 100 million. Earlier, he said, a single Project Director of the Deputy Director level had to look after dozens of projects, which, he said, had badly affected the quality of work. Another contract employee alleged that their induction had prevented regular employees from misappropriating funds and awarding contracts to their near and dear ones. He said that senior regular employees of the Authority had been impeding creation of a contract awarding section in the Authority, which, he informed, had been approved by the CDA Board a year ago. They would never let the section create so that the powers for award of contract remain with them. An official of the Project Management Office (PMO), while justifying their presence in the Authority, said that the office was not a burden on CDA, but he said, the same had generated Rs 3 billion revenue during the past two years. The revenue had been generated through auction of plots and execution of joint ventures with private sector, he said. The mega projects for which special project directors have been hired on contract are Zero Point Interchange, F-9 Park, Kashmir Highway, Convention and Cultural Complex (CCC) near Shakarparian, Expansion of Margazar Zoo, electrical and mechanical work in D-12, CCC and F-9 Park.