The senior faculty members of Pir Mehr Ali Shah Arid Agriculture University Rawalpindi (AAUR) have approached the Lahore High Court after the university administration asked them to pay back the allowances paid to them since 2001.
Those who have approached the LHC’s Rawalpindi bench include, Dr Irfanul Haque Professor Department of Plant Pathology, Dr Muhammad Azam Malik Professor Department of Agronomy, Dr S M Saqlain Naqvi Chairman Department of Biochemistry, Dr Abdul Razzaq Associate Professor Department of Agronomy and Dr Ghulam Jilani Associate Professor Department of Soil Sciences.
The senior professors of the AAUR challenged the May 13, 2011 notification of the university that had directed the teachers to pay back the “orderly allowances” they had received since 2009. The teachers were paid Rs2,375 as orderly allowance every month from 2001 to 2009 under the order of the university administration. However, Rs3,500 they received every month after 2009, have been demanded back by the administration, as it claims that the orders for this payment were reversed in that year.
Citing AAU vice chancellor and secretary Agriculture Government of Punjab as respondents the professors through their advocate Muhammad Aslam Khan have maintained that the university administration had not issued any show cause notices to them before stopping the allowance. Furthermore, the university administration has also ordered for deduction of the already paid money from the officials’ ceremony.
The petitioners have further asserted that the payment of the allowance was initiated after the approval of the syndicate of the university following the university rules and regulations. It was not any illegal payment that needed deduction, they added.
They said the university suspended the payment on the direction of secretary department of agriculture. “This department could not ask for stopping the allowances paid in accordance with university rules,” said the lawyer.
The university teachers said the departments of agriculture and finance did not object to the payment of the allowance.
The petitioners added the orderly allowance was also being paid to the teachers of Sindh Agriculture University in Tando Jam and other universities in the country.
They have prayed to the high court to set aside the AAU notification and stop the authorities from deducting the money form their salaries.
Published in The Express Tribune, June 28th, 2011.
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