PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government has started the ball rolling on the regular appointment of vice-chancellors to the province’s 16 public sector universities

by appointing the chairman and two members to the academic search committee for recommending names to fill vacancies.

Currently, the five-strong high-powered committee has two members as noted educationist and former Higher Education Commission chairman Prof Attaur Rehman resigned from the chairman’s office last month to protest the repeated cancellation of the date for interviews of candidates.

Two other members, including Prof Arif Nazir Butt and Prof Iqbal Chaudhry, also followed suit.

Official says interviews of candidates to begin shortly

Now, the caretaker government has appointed former member of the Planning Commission Prof Kauser A. Malik as the chairman and convener of the committee and Prof emeritus of the Quaid-I-Azam University Islamabad Prof M Aslam Baig and former VC of the Haripur University Prof Anwarul Hassan Gillani as its members.

Officials in the higher education department told Dawn that the committee required all members to be present in its meeting to recommend names for VC posts and since three members were not there, the panel didn’t meet.

They said the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Universities Act, 2021, has empowered the academic search committee to conduct interviews of the candidates for the post of VCs and recommend to the government a panel of three persons for a VC post.

Section 12 of the law states, “The Vice-Chancellor shall be appointed by the chancellor on the advice of the government from a panel of three candidates recommended by the Academic Search Committee.”

Officials in the higher education department said that Governor of KP Ghulam Ali, in exercise of powers conferred upon him under Section 12(2) of the law, had approved the names for the academic search committee on the advice of the chief minister.

Section 12(2) of the law states, “An Academic Search Committee, for the recommendation of persons suitable for appointment as Vice-Chancellor, shall be constituted by the Chancellor on the advice of Government.”

The law also said the convener should be an academician of national or international repute with at least 50 international publications.

When contacted, secretary of the higher education department Arshad Khan said that the academic search committee would begin interviewing candidates for the vacancies of VCs soon.

He said that the HED had never delayed interviews for VC posts and instead, interviews were delayed once due to a stay order issued by the court of law and twice on the directives issued by the Governor’s House for unidentified reasons.

“This time around, we are committed to holding interviews as soon as possible so that no one can create hurdles to this VC selection process,” he said.

The universities functioning without regular VCs include Gomal University Dera Ismail Khan, University of Agriculture Dera Ismail Khan, Women University Swabi, University of Veterinary and Animal Sciences

Swat, University of Engineering and Applied Sciences Swat, Abbottabad University, University of Shangla, Khushal Khan Khattak University Karak, University of Lakki Marwat, University of Engineering and Technology Mardan, Hazara University Mansehra, University of Peshawar, Abdul Wali Khan University Mardan and Agriculture University Peshawar.

Published in Dawn, December 24th, 2023