ISLAMABAD -  Principal Information Officer Rao Tehsin Ali has decided to challenge the Dawn Leaks report in the Islamabad High Court (IHC), The Nation has learnt.

The Prime Minister’s Office on Saturday issued directives that “Rao Tehsin Ali, principal information officer of the Ministry of Information shall be proceeded against under the Efficiency and Disciplinary Rules 1973 on the charges based on findings in the instant report”.

Later, the federal government asked Rao Tehsin to report to the Establishment Division.

According to the Establishment Division’s notification “Rao Tehsin Ali Khan, a BS-22 officer of the Information Group, presently posted as principal information officer, Press Information Department (PID), Information and Broadcasting Division, is transferred and directed to report to the Establishment Division, with immediate effect and until further orders.”

Two senior officers of the Information Group including Shafqat Jalil and Muhammad Saleem are the strongest candidates for the slot of the PIO.

The Establishment Division would send names of three senior bureaucrats of grade-22 to the Prime Minister’s Office for appointment as members of the committee.

According to rules, any civil servant can file appeal to the prime minister against his punishment after proving the allegations wrong. Sources also claimed that the PIO would also write to the interior ministry to provide him a copy of Dawn Leaks report. A senior official of Information Group told The Nation that the Information Group Association had condemned the action against one of the most senior officers of the information service.  He said that the Information Group Association had also called a meeting next week in this regard and the association would stand with Rao Tehsin, because he was not directly or indirectly involved in this matter.

He said that how a PIO could feed a news about a meeting when he was not even present in that meeting.

The official said that the incumbent government always ignored the services of Information Group and it had refused twice to promote its officers to grade-22 in the past.

He said that the federal government did not appoint a regular Information Secretary from Information Group after the retirement of former secretary information Muhammad Azam. The Nation tried to contact Rao Tehsin over the phone and through text messages to get his version on the issue but he did not respond till the filing of this report.