PESHAWAR, Jan 4: Irregularities have been detected in the promotion and appointments to higher posts at the University of Peshawar, an official report said.

Reports filed by the Governor's Inspections Team on Aug 31, 2000, one Sherinzada Khattak, was given rapid promotion in clear violation of university's rules, replacing Iftikhar Hussain as registrar, leading to a tussle between the two souring the university's academic atmosphere.

It was recommended that both the officials be posted outside the university.Contrary to the GIT's recommendations, Sherinzada Khattak was posted as the director academics of the newly-established directorate of admission on Jan 27, 2001. The post was created without the approval of the university's senate, which is supposed to approve appointments to all new departments.

Likewise, another official, Mohammad Javaid Khan, was appointed as the university's registrar in early 2001 despite having confessed about misappropriating Rs582,000. He had withdrawn the said amount for printing question papers of MA/MSc examinations of 1996-97, as controller of examinations. The question papers were cyclo-styled rather than printed.

The matter was brought to the notice of the university's senate, which in its meeting on Jan 18, 2000 constituted a two- member committee to probe the case.

Instead of presenting the inquiry report in the next meeting of the Senate, the matter was shelved. Instead of being held responsible for the misappropriation, the same official was appointed as the director, planning and development, on June 6, 2001.

Despite him being a geology professor, the same official was assigned the task of upgrading the department of computer science to the institute of information technology, ignoring a professor in the relevant department. Recently, he has been promoted to BPS-21.

Prof Dr Waqar Ali Shah of the statistics department was transferred and appointed as the chairman of the department of computer science department.House allotments have also not been made on merit. One Saqlain Bangash, who is a caretaker of a six-rooms guest house of the university, has been allotted an F-type house on the campus, which are meant for professors.

The same person has been allowed to act as the university's security officer. His appointment as the guest house's caretaker had previously been rejected by the university's syndicate/senate on two separate occasions.

Interestingly, a key-punch operator at the office of dean, faculty of arts, was allotted B-type residential quarter. The office order issued on Dec 12, 2003, said that the said operator will occupy the quarter on Dec 31, 2004, the day his father gets retired. The quarter belongs to Islamia Collegiate School, where dozens of teachers are on the waiting list for to be allotted quarters.