LAHORE, July 4: The Lahore High Court proposed on Friday that the University of Health Sciences should temporarily return its degree-awarding status to the Punjab University and act as an examining body only.

The proposal was put forward by Justice Tassadaq Hussain Jilani, senior member of a full bench hearing the petitions of medical students against compulsory affiliation of their respective colleges with the UHS —- who would respond to it by July 8.

In view of the problems currently being faced by the UHS, the Punjab University should be allowed to issue degrees to medical students for another two to three years, Justice Jilani observed.

The UHS vice-chancellor had cancelled the affiliation of all medical colleges with the Punjab University on Dec 2, 2002, with the exception of the King Edward Medical College and the Fatima Jinnah Medical College. The UHS had affiliated the colleges with itself and was to issue degrees to medical students.

The bench further ruled that the UHS might not initially be in a position to deliver on all the promises made in the UHS Ordinance because of academic and administrative problems, and the proposed temporary arrangement might help it out. The court could not overlook the reservations of students about international recognition, which the UHS was yet to acquire, Justice Jilani said.

UHS counsel Abdul Hafeez Pirzada had argued that the petitions were premature and based only on apprehensions regarding the recognition of UHS abroad. He claimed that the UHS was likely to be recognized by the World Health Organization shortly.

He said if the Bahauddin Zakaria University and the Faisalabad Agriculture University were acceptable to students, what was the harm in accepting the UHS as a degree-awarding institution.

According to Mr Pirzada, students could not claim relief on grounds of a legitimate expectation, which could only be invoked in situations where the government had violated a contract. He also cited a judgment of the Supreme Court to support this argument.

“If the court feels that the UHS ordinance is not contravening the 1973 Constitution, it is bound to uphold the compulsory affiliation of different medical colleges with the UHS.” He submitted that under the 1973 Constitution the court had the authority to enforce the principles of a policy decision pronounced by the government and could not strike down the UHS if it was a valid law.

It was claimed by the counsel that even if some minor procedural and legal irregularities were committed by the UHS management in implementing the ordinance, the court should overlook such lapses and uphold the spirit of the law.

“It takes years to become a university of international repute and in our case the mess is too deep to be cleared within a short span of time,” the counsel maintained, adding that the creation of UHS was the first attempt of government in the 55-year history of the country at setting up an institution par excellence at a cost of billions of rupees.

To a court query, he submitted that the UHS vice-chancellor’s order disaffiliating medical colleges with the PU was also placed before the syndicate for final approval despite the fact that the exercise was not mandatory as the order emanated from Section 37 of the UHS Ordinance.

The other counsel for UHS, Najamul Hassan Kazmi, furnished the court with certain documents including the UHS correspondence with the federal government and the PMDC with regard to its recognition. As claimed by Mr Kazmi, the federal government had also written to the WHO for including the name of UHS in its directory.

“None of the seven medical colleges whose affiliation with the PU was cancelled had approached the court in its own capacity. Some of the petitions do not even carry the names and signatures of those students who have challenged their colleges’ affiliation with the UHS,” he argued.

He opposed the last week’s notification of the provincial government exempting the KEMC and the FJMC from medical colleges’ compulsory affiliation with the UHS, arguing that the relevant record of both the colleges had been transferred to the UHS following the affiliation orders.