PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government on Wednesday appointed 27 treasury members of the provincial assembly as parliamentary secretaries, taking the tally of the provincial cabinet and allied office-holders to 61.

The government`s official website puts the strength of the cabinet at 18.

Also, there are four advisers and 12 special assistants to the chief minister.

Five of the new parliamentary secretaries are from Swat, three from Lower Dir and two each from Abbottabad and Nowshera. The remaining parliamentary secretaries are from other districts, each getting one position, according to a notification of the administration department.

The appointments were notified after their approval by Chief Minister Ali Amin Gandapur.

The notification said that the newlyappointed parliamentary secretaries included MPA Ali Shah for the housing department, MPA Akhtar Ali for the law and parliamentary affairs department, MPA Hamidur Rehman for mines and mineral department, MPA Sultan Room for the Auqaf, Hajj and religious affairsdepartment and Mohammad Naeem for the agriculture department.

Likewise, MPA Gul Ibrahim was made parliamentary secretary for the culture, tourism and archeology, MPA Mohammad Azam Khan for excise and taxation, MPA Shafiullah Khan for anticorruption, Obaidur Rehman for health, Ajmal Khan for sports and youth affairs department, Abdul Kabir Khan for higher education, Fazal Haq for prisons, Mohammad Riaz for revenue and estate, Rajab Ali Khan Abbasi for zakat and ushr, Iftikhar Ahmed Jadoon for food and Murtaza Khan Tarakai for finance.

The other parliamentary secretaries included Amir Farzand Khan (irrigation), Irshad Ali Umerzai (transport and mass transit), Mehboob Sher (communication and works), Abdul Ghani(population welfare), Mian Mohammad Umar (public health engineering), Ishfaq Ahmed (local government), Shaifullah (science and technology), Mohammad Usman (relief and rehabilitation), Asif Khan (establishment and administration), Ajab Gul (elementary and secondary education) and Malik Adeel Iqbal (livestock).

When contacted, spokesman for the provincial government Barrister Mohammad Ali Saif said that the provincial cabinet was an executive part of the government.

`Parliamentary secretaries are members of the house and meant to keep a check on the performance of the provincial cabinet members and assist thehouse`s standing committees.

Parliamentary secretaries are not members of the provincial cabinet and instead, they`re going to keep a check on the executive,` he said.

Under Article 130(6)of the Constitution, the cabinet shall be collectively responsible to the provincial assembly and the total strength of the cabinet shall not exceed eleven per cent of the total membership of a provincial assembly.

Also, Clause 11 of that article said that the chief minister shall not appoint more than five advisers. However, there is no such restriction about the appointment of special assistants to the chief minister.

On the other hand, Rules of the Procedure of the KP Assembly defines the parliamentary secretary as `a member so appointed or designated by the Chief Minister under any law for the time being in vogue.

On the other hand, Section 5-A of the KP Rules of Business, 1985, reads, `Parliamentary secretary of a department shall, subject to any general or special order, issued by the chief minister in this behalf, deal with such parliamentary affairs concerning that department and perform such public relations and functions as may be entrusted to him by the minister provided that a parliamentary secretary shall not be required to undertake any function which may entail any interference in the internal working or administration of a department or an attached department.