PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa governor has criticised Vice-Chancellor of the Women’s University, Swabi, Prof Shahana Urooj Kazmi for ‘illegally approaching the prime minister bypassing the provincial government’.

“Prof Shahana is trying to distort and conceal facts by citing provincial prejudices as the reasons behind the disciplinary proceedings against her,” the Governor’s House said in a statement issued here on Saturday.

Governor Shah Farman, who is also the chancellor of the public sector universities in the province, recently sent Prof Shahana on forced leave for 90 days in light of the findings of an inquiry by the Governor’s Inspection Team (GIT).

“The GIT had conducted inquiry against her in light of several complaints received by the chancellor’s office and higher education department. Ironically, she has never tried to give an account of her illegal actions, which were unearthed and proved by the GIT,” read the statement.

The statement added that the VC was accused of making illegal recruitment not only from other provinces but also from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, so her allegations of the provincial biasness were totally baseless.

According to it, the GIT report has proved all allegations against the VC, including illegal appointments on contractual or emergency basis and without recommendation of need assessment committee, illegal assigning of the additional charge of administrative posts to 27 faculty staff, and illegal appointment of Jazib Shamim without the relevant degree as PRO.

“The other allegation proved against her include the illegal appointment of three superannuated persons on administrative position, grant of illegal increments to the contractual employees, advertisement of posts already subjudiced in the Peshawar High Court, illegal appointment of Col Rizwan Ahmad as registrar, who was also not eligible for the post.”

The statement read that the GIT report had also proved that the VC had been drawing ‘abnormal and non-fixed’ monthly salary of Rs608,400 without approval by the competent forum, illegally getting reimbursement of the amount of air ticket used to travel to her house in Karachi, and illegally recruiting 21 faculty and administrative officers.

When contacted, Prof Shahana rejected the GIT inquiry report and said the inquiry was orchestrated against her when she appointed foreign qualified teaches with PhD degrees and not the people recommended by authorities at the helm of affairs.

About the GIT report’s revelation about the appointment of two dozens relatives from Sindh by her, Prof Shahana said the chancellor should conduct the DNA test of all those employees and if they were found to be her relatives, she would resign instead of contesting the case.

She said she had followed the university’s law, which didn’t stop her from appointing highly qualified people from other provinces.

• Published in Dawn, June 20th, 2021*