LAHORE: Ad-hocism seems to be at its peak in the province as 11 public sector universities and the Punjab Higher Education Commission (PHEC) have been working without regular heads for the last two and a half years creating academic and administrative issues.

Public sector universities working without regular vice chancellors (VCs) have been divided into three categories - general, women and specialised.

General category varsities include Bahauddin Zakariya University (BZU), Multan; Islamia University, Bahawalpur (IUB), University of Gujrat, University of Narowal and Government College University, Faisalabad (GCUF).

The women category includes Women University, Multan; Women University, Sialkot; Government College Women University, Faisalabad; and Lahore College for Women University.

The specialised category includes University of Engineering and Technology (UET), Lahore; UET of Taxila; and University of Home Economics, Lahore.

Earlier, the government appointed Women’s University of Swabi VC Prof Dr Khanzadi Fatima Khattak as the VC of the GCUF, and Institute of Administrative Sciences, University of Punjab, Director Prof Dr Nasira Jabeen as VC of the Government College for Women University, Sialkot, for a four years term but both tendered their resignations before joining the posts last month.

The search committee of the women universities also completed interviews of the candidates for Women University of Multan VC and sent its top three nominees to Chief Minister Sardar Usman Buzdar office last month, pending approval.

However, Prof Dr Kanwal Amin who was appointed as University of Home Economics, Lahore, VC joined the office.

The search committee constituted by the government to interview for the post of VCs of UET of Lahore and Taxila also completed the process and sent summaries of the top three nominees for each post to the chief minister office last month.

The government has yet to start process for appointing VCs for the BZU, Multan, University of Narowal, IUB and GCUF.

The search committee constituted for the post of chairperson of the PHEC sent the top three candidates’ names to the chief minister’s office. The committee suggested COMSATS Islamabad Faculty of Science Dean Prof Dr Arshad Saleem Bhatti, University of Agriculture Faisalabad VC Prof Dr Muhammad Ashraf and former Lahore UET VC Dr Fazal Ahmad Khalid.

Federation of All Pakistan Universities Association Punjab president Dr Hamid Mukhtar told Dawn that vacant posts of VCs and PHEC chairperson were creating several problems in public universities as the research programmes were closed for not having approval of grants.

He said he had challenged the criteria of search committees formation and function in the court as he demanded impartiality in the process. He also questioned search committee’s interviews of candidates for the post of VCs in women and specialised universities without completing quorum of the committees.

Punjab Higher Education Minister Raja Humayun Sarfraz said the process of appointing VCs in universities in general category would resume soon and a summary had been moved to the CM’s office to change some members of the search committees.

He said the summary of appointment of Women University, Multan, VC had been sent to the law department, the selected VC for Sialkot university was not willing to join the office while the Faisalabad varsity VC would join by July 27. He said the summary of the nominees for the post of the PHEC chief was also being evaluated at the law department.

Published in Dawn, June 12th, 2019