LAHORE: No meeting of the Board of Governors (BoG) of the University of Health Sciences (UHS) was held in the last two years or so due to the constant absence of its chairman, Ishaq Dar, who is holding the portfolio of Ministry of Finance.

More shockingly, the pro-chancellor of the university, who was supposed to be the Punjab health minister, has never ever visited the institute to discharge his duties vested in him through the UHS Ordinance 2002. This high-profile designation is lying unused since 2002, raising a question over the lawmakers as well as the authorities concerned who had added this office but failed to make it functional, making a mockery of the rules and regulations of the university.

Meanwhile, the two-year persistent absence of chairman of the top body of the university (BoG) went unnoticed as the university ordinance is “silent” regarding any administrative action against the “absentee”, a senior official who is close to the information says while talking to Dawn.

He says the ordinance has made it mandatory that “the board shall meet at least twice a year on the dates to be fixed by the chairperson of the board”.

The UHS Ordinance 2002, however, has fixed a ‘penalty’ for the some members of the BoG. Like, it has declared that “the office of a non-official member of the board shall become vacant if he resigns or fails to attend three consecutive meetings of the board without sufficient cause or leave of absence”.

Consisting of seven members, the BoG is said to be of high authority and an integral body of the UHS, followed by the Syndicate, executive committee, academic council, selection board, finance and planning committee, board of faculties, advanced studies and research board, discipline committee, etc.

The official says the BoG has distinction over other bodies for dealing the key issues relating to the general supervision and control of the administrative, academic and financial affairs and the powers to lay down the policies of the university.

He adds that these matters required to be discussed by the BoG meetings keeping in view their sensitivity of nature and to get legal warranty.

Ironically, in absence of the BoG chairman, the university is running these affairs through four standing committees as an alternate solution instead of taking them up in the board meeting triggering debate on the legal status of the decisions.

The official says the committees included a sub-committee, academic and technical committee, admin and human resource, and a legal committee.

The conveners of these committees have no option other than to follow a very odd way to get approval from BoG chairman Ishaq Dar who is spending time mostly in Islamabad.

The highly confidential and original documents pertaining to the decisions on sensitive issues of the UHS are dispatched to Islamabad through ‘unsafe hands’ taking a risk of its displacement or misuse.

The official says the term of the UHS BoG is going to end in the coming October and the government has again indicated that Ishaq Dar will be the next chairman of the board declaring him ‘inevitable’ for the medical university instead of giving the role to some suitable official.

When contacted, UHS spokesman Muhammad Atif confirmed that no BoG meeting of the university was held in the last two years and its affairs were being run by some committees. He said Mr Ishaq Dar could not attend meetings as he was addressing national level mega issues pertaining to finance.

To a question about the legal status of the committee’s decisions, Mr Atif said the committees were formed by the competent authority and there was no controversy on the legal status of their decisions.

Published in Dawn, May 30th, 2015

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