Propriety: Caretaker CM’s order barring PTB from textbook bids challenged

‘Sethi, the Publishers and Booksellers Association chief, acted in self-interest’.

LAHORE:

The Lahore High Court on Monday issued notice to the Punjab government and other respondents on a petition challenging the caretaker chief minister’s order refraining the Punjab Textbook Board (PTB) from participating in bids for the development of textbook manuscripts.

Justice Shujaat Ali Khan issued this order on the petition of Mohammed Akhtar Sherani, general secretary of the PTB Employees Welfare Society. The judge sought replies from the respondents – the chief secretary, the Punjab Curriculum Authority, the PTB, the schools education secretary and Sethi, as central chairman of the Pakistan Publishers and Booksellers Association – by June 3.

The PTB, prior to the passage of the 18th Amendment, would invite writers to send in manuscripts for textbooks in an open competition, select the best scripts and then publish the textbooks itself or through private publishers. After the devolution of education to the provinces, the Punjab government passed the Punjab Curriculum Authority Act of 2012, curtailing the PTB’s role. But the PTB was still supposed to compete in the development and selection of textbooks, said petitioner’s counsel Hafiz Tariq Nasim.

He said that Sethi, as chairman of the Pakistan Publishers and Booksellers Association, made a representation to the chief minister on June 12, 2012, asking that the PTB be refrained from developing manuscripts for its own books. The chief minister took no action and the Punjab Curriculum Authority published an advertisement on April 10, 2013, inviting bids from private persons and agencies including the PTB in an on open competition, he said.

The PTB made a bid, but before a decision was made, Sethi was made caretaker chief minister of the Punjab. On April 18, the caretaker chief minister, on an application filed by Pakistan Publishers and Booksellers Association Vice Chairman Saleem Malik, barred the PTB from participating in the bid, the petitioner’s counsel said. The Punjab Curriculum Authority then re-advertised for bids for the textbooks on May 13, barring the PTB from participating.

The petitioner argued that the caretaker chief minister’s decision on the application was illegal and unlawful as it violated a well-settled axiom of the law: “No one can be a judge of his own cause.”

The petitioner asked the court to set aside the PCA advertisement dated May 13 and restore its advertisement dated April 10 allowing the PTB to participate in the open competition for the development of textbooks.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 28^th, 2013.