VCs vacant posts: Rejected candidates see flaws in criteria, procedures

Special committee submits finalists’ list to board.

FAISALABAD:

A special committee designated to finalise candidates for the six vacant posts of vice chancellors (VCs) at Punjab universities has sent its recommendations to the board.

In the wake of massive complaints and the alleged violation of selection criteria for the VCs at seven universities, committee head Syed Babar Ali has now submitted his recommendation of finalists to the authorities. The vice chancellor posts at six universities of the Punjab, including University of Education, Lahore, Lahore College for Women University, Bahauddin Zakariya University, Multan, University of Sargodha, Government College University, Lahore, and Fatima Jinnah Women University, Rawalpindi have been lying vacant for the past six months. The Punjab government finally advertised the posts on February 4 and the task for collections and initial processing of applications in line with the set criteria and parameters was assigned to the provincial Higher Education Department.

A total of 251 academies applied for the top-slot of the six universities. The special committee headed by Punjab Higher Education additional secretary Akram Chaudhry, scrutinised the applications and short-listed 80 candidates out of 251, to be presented before the search committee.

A search committee led by Syed Babar Ali with former foreign minister Sartaj Aziz Khan, University of Engineering, Lahore, vice chancellor Lt Gen Muhammad Akram, Punjab Additional Chief Secretary Sami Saeed and Secretary Higher Education Haseeb Athar Khan conducted interviews of the short listed candidates in two weeks.The search committee has now submitted its recommendations for suitable candidates which will be handed over to the Punjab chief minister by next week and later to the governor for formal approval. A number of candidates who were dropped in the processes blamed the provincial higher education department of deviating from the set standards and of picking their favourite candidates based on political and personal connections.“These people have no mechanism to determine the finalists fairly. They have picked the people they knew and rejected the others with merit purely on a pretext of ‘short listing’,” said candidate Rasool Kareemullah, from Faisalabad. Dean of the University of Agriculture, Faisalabad Dr Muhammad Ashfaq, who applied for the vice chancellor post at Sargodha University, said “The so-called ‘short-listing’ process is a sham. I have over 34 years of teaching experience and they have me on a short list.” A number of other candidates who were dropped during the processes also levelled similar charges against the selection committee.

Muhammad Akram Chaudhary said that the recruitment process was transparent. “I hope that the six candidates we have forwarded will be approved,” he said. “Those complaining about the new process actually preferred the old system in which selection depended on who they knew not whether they were qualified for the post.”

Published in The Express Tribune, April 13^th, 2011.