Equalling scores: Larkana varsity teacher, VC accuse each other of fraud

They blame each other of obtaining passports in a capacity other than a government servant's.

SUKKUR:

A professor of a Larkana medical university has taken the vice-chancellor to court for allegedly misguiding the passport authorities and obtaining a passport under the category of a businessman, instead of a government servant.

Shaheed Benazir Bhutto Medical University, Larkana, Prof. Dr Saeed Ahmed Sangi went to court against vice-chancellor Prof. Akbar Haider Soomro, allegedly after the latter filed a similar complaint against the professor.



Speaking to The Express Tribune, Prof. Sangi said that the scuffle between the VC and himself started the previous year over organisational matters of the World Heart Day event.

The relations were further strained in January this year when Prof. Soomro filed an application in court alleging that Prof. Sangi had obtained a passport as a private person instead of a government servant.

This application was filed to the court by an employee, Perwez, at the behest of Prof. Soomro, he claimed. "Following the application, the Federal Investigation Agency had registered a case against me and I was kept in detention for three days," he said.

Dr Sangi claimed that Professors Soomro and Dr Hassan Shaikh also held passports in capacities other than government servants and called for similar action against them. "If I have committed an offence, so has Prof. Soomro," he remarked. A petition had been filed in the Sukkur district and sessions court against Dr Soomro on the charges of misguiding the passport authorities. The case was transferred to the Larkana district and sessions court where it remains pending.



When contacted, Prof. Soomro said Dr Sangi was a liar and said that he had not registered any FIR against him. He further said that he had obtained his passport in the capacity of a businessman after his retirement from varsity service.

Meanwhile, Sukkur's passport office superintendent Muzamil Khan told The Express Tribune that government servants are required to submit an official letter issued by their department if they wish to travel abroad. If a government servant obtains a passport in the capacity of businessman or private person, he commits an offence punishable under the Passport Act and may be jailed for three years for fraud.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 15^th, 2013.