Promotion denial: QAU vice-chancellor, registrar put on notice

ISLAMABAD:

The Islamabad High Court (IHC) has issued a notice to vice-chancellor and registrar of the Quaid-i-Azam University on a petition of a faculty member, who said he was not being considered for the slot of professorship despite his seniority and due academic qualification.

The petitioner, Dr Ishtiaq Ahmad, who is an associate Prof on the Tenure Track System (TTS) at the QAU’s School of Politics and International Relations (SPIR), and presently serving as Quaid-i-Azam Fellow at the Oxford University,  has maintained  that despite seniority and due academic qualification, his candidature for the post of professor at the SPIR was being denied on the basis of “TTS Statutes Version 2.0” that was yet to be signed by the president of Pakistan.

Clause 1(A) of TTS Statutes Version 2.0 states that “these statutes shall come into force with effect from the date that they are approved by the President of Pakistan, who is also chancellor of the QAU”.

IHC judge Shaukat Aziz Siddiqui while accepting the petition issued a notice to the respondents to submit replies. Two posts of professors at the SPIR were advertised in March 2013. In July 2013, a scrutiny committee while rejecting Dr Ahmad’s candidature had approved applications of two junior faculty members.

The petition, however, has maintained that neither of the two applicants was academically qualified for the position.

In January, after a selection board also recommended the two names, an inquiry committee was formed on Dr Ahmad’s request to investigate illegalities.

The inquiry report was subsequently submitted to the vice-chancellor but Ahmad was deprived of the copy of the report saying “it contained sensitive information”.

The reason for this refusal, said the petitioner, was that the report could have exposed gross misconduct of the QAU administration in the case.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 2^nd, 2015.