Medical and Dental Council: Chief justice asked to take notice of ‘illegal’ elections

YDA to protest unless independent commission set up for fresh polls.

LAHORE:

The Young Doctors Association (YDA) Punjab has demanded that an independent commission be set up to hold fresh elections at the Pakistan Medical and Dental Council (PMDC).

Speaking at a press conference at Jinnah Hospital on Tuesday, YDA leader Dr Amir Bandesha said that the elections held by the caretaker council on August 5 violated several rules and court orders and asked the chief justice of Pakistan to take notice of the matter.

“As per the rules, two thirds of the council members must be present at the election. The minimum number of members who must be present to hold elections is 25, while the caretaker council conducted elections in the presence of just 14 members,” Dr Bandesha said. “Members from the Punjab, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, Azad Jammu and Kashmir and Balochistan didn’t attend the election session on August 5.”

Professor Masood Hameed’s election as president and Professor Muhammad Awais’s as vice president was illegal, he said.

He said that the federal government had asked the council not to call an election session, but it did so anyway. The federal government’s silence since was also a cause for concern. “Corruption, issuance of bogus degrees and misappropriations at the PMDC are at a peak,” he added. YDA officials demanded the formation of an independent commission to hold elections, failing which they would launch a protest campaign. “YDA branches from across the country will meet in Islamabad after Eid. If the elections are not held independently, we will run a countrywide campaign and also surround the PMDC office,” an official said.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 7^th, 2013.