Pakistan consulate extends services to help community

Jamil Khan, Senior Reporter

Pakistan mission in Dubai is planning to start ‘khuli kuchehry’ (open court) to listen to the grievances of community members residing in Dubai and Northern Emirates on fortnightly basis.

There will be open courts on site as well as via online (zoom link) to facilitate the expats on the directives of Government of Pakistan to its all mission abroad.

This was stated by Hassan Afzal Khan, Pakistan Consul General to Dubai and Northern Emirates in an interview with the Gulf Today.

The open courts or ‘Khuli Kuchehry’ were held regularly within the consulate general in Dubai before the COVID-19 pandemic.

“In this regard, we are in discussion with social centres in Sharjah, Ras Al Khaimah and community’s elders in other emirates to finalise the dates to organise these sessions to facilitate the expatriates on their own doorsteps,” he said.

He also informed that the ‘PakinDubai’ Mobile App for community residing in UAE is available on the iOS market place.

“Within the timeframe of next 4 weeks, we are expecting the Urdu version of this app available for both Android and iOS App Stores to benefit the huge number of community members especially blue collars expatriates,” he added.

Responding a question the CG Khan told that the recently installed state-of-the-art telephone exchange system in the consulate has been receiving around 800 calls in which mostly received between 8am to 4pm.

“Earlier more than 25 per cent of calls were either dropped or not properly catered but now we are happy to cater almost 99 per cent calls out of around 800 calls through this exchange and have the facility of attending 14 callers simultaneously with the hold time of around 60-90 seconds,” he said.

Last month, the precedent CG unveiled the new telephone exchange system with 6-lines and announced that they carried out this and other works including baby feeding room and prayer room for female visitors from the resources of consulate general.

“We are working to install more lines and induct two male staff to expand the time duration to 24-hour for outside callers to the consulate.

Currently we have five female call attendant to cater 6-lines and we are planning to extend the exchange with 7-8 lines besides introducing Interactive Voice Response (IVR) options with call recording and install pre-recorded messages to answer regular/general queries,” he said.

In response to recently launched of campaign for Pakistan’s participation in the Expo 2020 in Dubai, the Consul General said that they are facilitating a dedicated team of four officials at the Pakistan Pavilion in Expo 2020 to promote country’s wide opportunities to the world.

“The Government of Pakistan has deputed a 4-member team from the Trade Development Authority of Pakistan (TDAP) to promote the country’s trade, tourism and investment under the banner of ‘Pakistan – The Hidden Treasure’. The delegate through a series of activities ahead of the kicking of the Expo 2020 will spread the message with the support of the consulate general in Dubai,” he said.

He also mentioned that around 140 activities have been finalised and a number of more will be done to cover all 180 days of the Expo 2020 with daily one event. “The series of activities in Pakistan pavilion in Expo 2020 under the ‘Pakistan – The Hidden Treasure’ theme will be dedicated to one province for one month to showcase their opportunities. All six provinces – Punjab, Sindh, Khyber Pukhtoonkhwa, Balochistan, Gilgit Baltistan and Kashmir – will be themed for one month each. The first month will be focusing on Balochistan province and the official from the provincial government to present the local opportunities in trade, tourism and investment sectors,” he said.

The Dubai Expo is a huge event and opportunity for participant countries like Pakistan to get benefit and reach the world with its unique opportunities in the sectors where the massive potential hidden, he added.