MULTAN: The Punjab government has issued a show-cause notice to Bahauddin Zakariya University (BZU) Vice-Chancellor Dr Khwaja Alqama over irregularities with regard to the establishment of the BZU Lahore sub-campus.

The notice has been issued through a letter No SO (Univ) 6-6/2013 by Higher

Education Department Additional Secretary Dr Shoaib Anwar on Sept 23.

“... Professor Dr Khwaja Alqama, Bahauddin Zakariya University vice chancellor, has committed irregularities with regard to establishment of BZU sub-campus in Lahore and there are suffi cient grounds to proceed against you,” reads the letter.

It said the VC was informed vide the separtment’s letters of July 29, 2013, Sept 26, Oct 7, 10, 14, 21 and 26 and Nov 5 and 11 that the chief minister had ordered an inquiry into the issue of the establishment of the BZU sub-campus in Lahore with the direction to issue a public notice/press release regarding suspended functioning of the campus in accordance with 2/2013 meeting of the university syndicate held on Sept 5-6, 2013 but it was never complied with.

“This department, vide letter No SO (Univ.) 6-6/-3(P) on June 30, 2014 directed the Registrar, BZU not to convene any meeting of the committee constituted by the syndicate in its meeting held on Sept 5-6, 2013 on the issue of sub-campus of BZU in Lahore, till the fi nalization of the inquiry ordered by the chief minister Punjab,” it said.

The letter further said the civil judge 1st class, Lahore, vide order on Sept 3, 2014, restrained the university management from including the subject of alleged grant of approval to BZU, sub-campus at Lahore in any of its forthcoming meetings of syndicate.

“It has been observed with great concern that the university management did not publish any public notice in national press as directed by the competent authority, the management convened meeting of sub-committee on June 30 and Aug 19, 2014 in clear violation of the directions of the department on the issue and the university management convened meeting of the syndicate on Sept 15 in utter violation of department’s directions and court’s orders for granting approval to BZU Sub-campus in Lahore with minority decision as fi ve members/exoffi cios boycotted the meeting,” it said.

In his letter, Dr Anwar said he was of the opinion that the said acts of the university management not only challenged the authority of the government but also created a bad precedent and were tantamount to misconduct and warranted holding an inquiry against the VC.

“Now, therefore, you are hereby called upon to show-cause in writing within seven days of the receipt of this notice as to why no inquiry proceeding under the Punjab Employees Effi ciency, Discipline and Accountability Act 2006 be initiated against you. Your reply to this show-cause notice should reach the undersigned within the said period, failing which it shall be presumed that you have no defence to offi cer,” the letter concluded.

The copies of the letter have been forwarded to the secretaries to governor and chief minister besides the principal secretaries to the education minister and secretary HED for information and necessary action.

Despite opposition by members syndicate and the offi cials of the HED, the university administration took steps one after another to legalise the campus.

The university administration took each and every step to benefi t the owners of subcampus and did not make any serious effort to vacate the stay order given by a lower court in favour of sub-campus administration despite even passing of one year to it that according to the sources is the result of an underhand deal.

The reasons behind not issuing a public notice to the newspapers on the direction of the HED and adopting illegal ways to legalise the sub-campus are the same.

A meeting of syndicate for the approval of the sub-campus was held on Sept 15, in which according to the sources almost all private members including the HEC nominee opposed the university’s decision of holding meetings over the issue in violation of the directions of court and the HED and approving the sub-campus in favour of the West Continental Group (WCG), a private partner, by breaking the quorum of the meeting.

They said the private members later were contacted by the VC and requested to provide their recommendations in writing with their signatures so that their recommendations could be made the meeting minutes.

They said besides the private members, the VC also signed the recommendations in which they agreed to approve the sub-campus with the condition to auction the subcampus under the Public Private Partnership Act by holding proper competitive public tendering before going to any deal with private partner; however later the university administration that was willing to give the sub-campus to a specifi c private partner tampered with the minutes by mentioning the name of the WCG.

They said the VC, who had signed on the recommendations of private members, wrote “not agreed” with his signature to withdraw his signature. They said two of the fi ve syndicate members representing the university faculty tried to stop the administration from tampering and issuing notifi cation of approval; however, the administration forced them to sign the minutes and later issued the notifi cation of approval of sub-campus in the favor of the WCG with claim that the approval was granted with the majority of fi ve members against the opposing four (private) members.

Published in Dawn, October 1st , 2014