IHC stops appointment letters for PMC employees

Kiyani warns govt to submit satisfactory answer on why PMDC was dissolved

ISLAMABAD: The main regulator of medical education and doctors in the country will have to wait a little while longer to start working optimally after it was stopped from finalising the appointment of employees in the body on Thursday.

A single-member bench of the Islamabad High Court (IHC), comprising Justice Mohsin Akhtar Kiyani, on Thursday barred the government from issuing final appointment letters to employees being recruited for the newly-formed Pakistan Medical Council (PMC). The council was created in October to replace the Pakistan Medical and Dental Council (PMDC) through a presidential ordinance.

During Thursday’s hearing over the dissolution of the PMDC, the court remarked that the government can adopt whatever recruitment process it deems appropriate but it cannot issue appointment letters to any of the successful candidates.

Moreover, the federal government was given a ‘final’ warning by the IHC to submit a satisfactory response over the need to create the PMC over PMDC.

At the outset of Thursday’s hearing, the counsel for PMDC said that as per the advertisement published in newspapers, ousted PMDC employees are also eligible to apply for posts in the PMC. However, he pleaded the court to halt the recruitment process for PMC.

The health ministry’s deputy secretary, who appeared before the bench on Thursday, said that they have responded to one of the applications filed by employees of the dissolved body.

At this, the court directed the secretary to submit responses in the other petitions as well.

Meanwhile, the PMC’s counsel informed the court that they had paid six months’ salary to ousted employees of PMDC as compensation.

He argued that the counsel for the PMDC employees had once commented before the court that the employees staged a protest despite being paid their dues.

The PMC’s counsel further maintained that they have already replied to the petition.

Justice Kiyani, however, remarked that the case will be disposed of this month and that he was setting the date for the next hearing during the winter vacations.

IHC irked over poor facilities for prisoners

IHC Chief Justice Athar Minallah on Thursday heard a petition of a convict against the lack of medical facilities in Adyala Jail.

During the hearing, CJ Minallah remarked that it was unjust that the medical boards are formed for the influential prisoners while there was nothing for ordinary ones.

He further remarked that such petitions only surface when the government does not care about the rights of ordinary inmates.

The executive has failed to exercise its authority regarding the prisoners, the court observed.

Deputy Attorney General (DAG) Tayyab Shah asserted that prisoners present such arguments to garner relief to which the IHC chief justice inquired whether the DAG has visited the Adiyala jail.

The DAG responded by saying, “No, I have visited the jail to attend trials but was never an inmate there.”

CJ Minallah recalled that he had been imprisoned there during the lawyers' movement and remarked that the conditions in the jail were inhospitable.

He further remarked that it would not entertain such petitions if the government was providing facilities to prisoners.

“A person held by the state against any offence possesses medical and basic human rights too, which should be rendered,” CJ Minallah remarked.

The court directed the secretaries of health and human rights to conduct the medical examination of the petitioner while he summoned a report on the state of basic human rights in the prison for the next hearing of the case on December 13.

Abarul Haq’s wait for PRSC increases

In another case, the IHC chief justice extended its stay against the appointment of singer and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) MNA Abrarul Haq as the chairman of the Pakistan Red Crescent Society (PRSC).

During a hearing of the case on Thursday, the Additional Attorney General (AAG) Tariq Khokar pleaded the court to grant him further time to submit a response in the case.

The court conceded his request and directed him to submit a copy of the answer with the court as well as the petitioner’s counsel before December 12.

The court also appointed Attorney General Anwar Mansoor as amicus curiae in the case and adjourned hearings until December 12.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 6^th, 2019.