VCs’ appointment: LHC dismisses challenge

‘There is no reason to interfere in the proceedings of the search committee’.

LAHORE:

The Lahore High Court (LHC) on Friday dismissed several petitions challenging the process of appointing vice chancellors (VC) to six public universities in the Punjab and the working of the search committee formed for the purpose.

Justice Nasir Saeed Sheikh had reserved verdict in the case on June 14. It was announced on Friday. The judge observed that there was no reason to interfere in the proceedings of the search committee.

Dismissing the petitioners’ argument that the committee members were not qualified for the job, Justice Sheikh remarked that the search committee comprised renowned educationists.

He said that the court was not convinced that the appointment process was marred by irregularities. The petitions were therefore dismissed.

Advocates Anwar Kamal and Rana Asadullah Khan, representing the petitioners, said that the decision will be challenged before a division bench through an intra court appeal.

The petitions were filed by Dr Hassan Amir Shah of the Government College University and Dr Bushra Khan of the Lahore College for Women University.

The petitioners said that search committee had ‘unlawfully’ changed the criteria for the job, mentioned in the advertisement, and gave preferences to foreign qualified candidates only. They said that the search committee lacked rules and a specific policy. None of the committee members, they said, had a PhD degree or teaching experience to judge and select VCs. The petitioners had asked the court to set aside the composition of the committee.

An additional advocate general, representing the Punjab government in the case, highlighted the credentials of the search committee members. He told the court that the committee had the Lahore University of Managements and Sciences pro chancellor and the Beaconhouse National University’s vice chancellor as its members. The petitioners, he said, had failed to attribute any malafide to the search committee and requested the court to dismiss the petitions.



Published in The Express Tribune, June 25^th, 2011.