PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government seems to be in a fix about the appointment of vice-chancellor of Shaheed Benazir Bhutto Women University Peshawar, which is pending for the last over one year.

“The process for appointment of SBBWU vice-chancellor has been completed five months ago. However, the provincial government is reluctant to appoint the vice-chancellor from a panel of three candidates, recommended by the academic search committee,” said sources.

Section 12 of the KP Universities Act 2012 states: “The vice-chancellor shall be appointed by the chancellor on the advice of government from a panel of three candidates recommended by the academic search committee.”

In the absence of the permanent VC, the previous PTI government had allowed the then VC of SBBWU, Prof Razia Sultana, to continue as VC till the appointment of a regular one. She was allowed through a notification issued in April 2018 while her three-year tenure as VC expired on May 6, 2018.

“It is worth mentioning that the academic search committee has completed the process for the appointment of VCs of three public sector universities in November 2018,” said sources.

They said that in the light of the recommendation of the academic search committee, the provincial government appointed VCs of University of Agriculture Peshawar and University of Haripur on March 15, 2019 but withheld appointment at SBBWU owing to unknown reasons.

Sources told Dawn that the academic search committee had recommended three names for the appointment of SBBWU vice-chancellor. They said that the incumbent VC, Prof Razia Sultana, topped the panel recommended by the academic search committee followed by the VC of Mardan Women University, Prof Ghazala Yasmeen, while Prof Noor Jehan stood on the third position.

Sources said that higher education department had moved the panel of three names to the chief minister on a summery for selecting one of them as VC of SBBWU.

They said that chief minister selected Prof Razia Sultana, who was on top of the panel, and moved the summery to the governor for final approval.

Under Article 105 of the Constitution, sources said, the governor/chancellor was bound to return the summary within 15 days. The governor could ask the cabinet or chief minister to reconsider an advice given to him and he had to act on the advice tendered after reconsideration within 10 days, they added.

It has been covered in Section 9 (7) of KP Universities Act, 2012, which states: “In the performance of his functions under this Act, the chancellor shall act in the same manner as the governor of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa acts under Article 105 of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan.”

However, sources said, the governor withheld the summary for the appointment of SBBWU vice-chancellor for the last five months as he was neither approving the summary nor returning it to the chief minister in violation of Article 105 of the Constitution.

They said that the chancellor was not in favour of appointing Prof Razia Sultana as VC for unknown reasons. “In such a situation, when the government avoids the name on top of the panel and selects another from the two other names, the governor is bound under the Supreme Court’s decision to mention reasons for not selecting the candidate on top of the panel,” said sources.

They said that there was uncertainty in SBBWU and higher education department about the appointment of VC.

Officials in the administration of SBBWU told Dawn that appointment of VC couldn’t be made during the previous one year, the university was unable to frame policies to be implemented in future for promotion of the institute.

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Governor Shah Farman was not available for comments.

Published in Dawn, July 22nd, 2019