PESHAWAR: A Peshawar High Court bench on Thursday stopped the provincial health department from dissolving the Post Graduate Medical Institute for the time being by ordering status quo on the matter.

Chief Justice Mazhar Alam Miankhel and Justice Waqar Ahmad Seth fixed Feb 17 for the next hearing into a petition filed by the Pakistan Medical Association, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa chapter, through its president, Dr Hussain Ahmad Haroon, against the proposed PGMI dissolution.

The bench issued notices to respondents in the petition including provincial health secretary, provincial government through chief secretary, Pakistan Medical and Dental Council through its secretary and College of Physicians and Surgeons through its secretary, and directed them to file their respective replies on the matter before the next hearing.

The petition was filed few days ago with the petitioner claiming that the government had decided to dissolve the PGMI.

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However, while the case had to be fixed for hearing the government has few days ago issued a notification through which it claimed it has devolved the PGMI to the hospitals and medical colleges functioning under the KP Medical Teaching Institutions Reforms Act, 2015.

Mian Muhibullah Kakakhel, lawyer for the petitioner, said the PGMI was the only institute in the province for providing postgraduate education to doctors including 4-year FCPS, various diplomas and master degrees for which Khyber Medical University (KMU) was the degree awarding body.

He said the MTI Act 2015 had ensured existence and progress of PGMI and had also ensured that degrees of PGMI be awarded by the KMU.

The lawyer said the PGMI was governing body of doctors at all levels including graduation, post-graduation and foreign qualification.

He said the PGMI was established at Lady Reading Hospital (LRH) through a notification on Aug 27, 1984, with the objective to produce specialists in the province.

Mr. Kakakhel added that the PGMI was given a separate land in Hayatabad and later on shifted to Hayatabad in 1997 to establish Hayatabad Medical Complex.

The lawyer said the first floor of the institute main building completed in Jan 2012, whereas the approval was given for the remaining structure including an auditorium, clinical skills laboratories and facilitation centre on June 9, 2014. For that purpose, Rs280 million was also sanctioned, he said.

The lawyer said these were purpose-built integrated buildings purely meant for developing high-level professional skills.

He said the clinical skills labs were near completion following which PGMI would be a centre of excellence not only for this province but for the whole country and even for Central Asia.

The lawyer said the present government through a notification on Nov 10, 2014, had strengthened the existing PGMI setup by making it an autonomous institution working under the administrative control of health secretary.

He said the provincial government including health department had decided to dissolve or do away with the PGMI, which was an illegal step.

Mr. Kakakhel said the PGMI was being dissolved with a mala fide intention and political motives, especially those by the KP chief minister.

He said now they had leant that the government had issued a notification for dissolving the PGMI and therefore, it would be appropriate to stop the government from taking further steps in this respect.

Published in Dawn, January 29th, 2016