I RECENTLY got an email from the Controller-General of Accounts, telling me that an amount of Rs2,797 would be deducted from my monthly salary, and that the deducted amount will be used to help the earthquake victims in Turkiye and Syria.

This is a noble cause, and everyone should come forward to help the affected people. But it is quite surprising that the government employees were not asked for their consent before making such deductions, and that has put a question mark on the procedural legitimacy of these deductions.

Instead of making it a compulsory act that has the potential to defeat the very purpose of contributing to a good cause, the government employees should have been asked to make contributions for the earthquake victims, and I am sure that a majority of people would have responded to that call positively.

I want to know exactly what provision of law has been invoked to make these deductions without taking the consent of those individuals from whose salaries the deductions are being made. Will somebody somewhere in the officialdom care to answer this procedural query? Name withheld on request Lahore