PESHAWAR: The Boards of Governors of medical teaching institutions (MTIs) are reluctant to repatriate the services of civil servants to health department for fear of de-recognition of their constituent medical and dental colleges by Pakistan Medical and Dental Council, according to sources.

Health department has been asking MTIs to repatriate the services of civil servants so that they can be posted elsewhere in provincial hospitals. However, sources said that most of civil servants worked as teachers in basic health sciences departments of MTIs. With their repatriation, those departments could face shortage of teachers and subsequent de-recognised of MTIs by PMDC, they added.

They said that the latest directive, issued to MTIs, asked for details about civil servants apparently to place their services at the disposal of health department but BoGs of MTIs were using delaying tactics to safeguard their colleges from facing issues of de-recognition.

A senior BoG member at one of the 10 MTIs told Dawn that most of the teachers in basic medical sciences including anatomy, physiology, biochemistry, forensic medicines, toxicology, pathology, community medicine and pharmacology were civil servants. “These subjects are taught to medical students from first to fourth year while they study clinical subjects only in the final year,” he said.

Posting out teachers of basic health sciences can create shortage of faculty

It is mandatory for any medical college to have complete faculties of basic sciences to be able to get recognised by PMDC, the regulatory of medical education in the country. MTIs are already short of basic sciences teachers as many have resigned and joined private medical colleges where they are in great demand. Therefore, MTIs cannot afford repatriation of civil servants to health department.

A basic science teacher told Dawn that there was no use of basic science teachers in non-teaching hospitals because all teaching hospitals had become MTIs. “So, why the department wants to transfer them out from MTIs,” he questioned.

He said that not only basic sciences but there were other faculty members, who worked on senior clinical positions in MTIs and there was no place to post them if their services were withdrawn from MTIs.

“MTIs have about 4,000 civil servants including 500 in Lady Reading Hospital, 400 in Hayatabad Medical and about 170 in Khyber Teaching Hospital Peshawar,” officials in health department said. They included assistant, associate and professors, whose services could be utilised only in MTIs as they could not be posted in other hospitals due to non-existence of posts, they added.

Representatives of doctors are averse to the government’s plan to evict civil servants from MTIs. An office-bear of Provincial Doctors Association said that MTIs had already converted posts of civil servants on which they had recruited contractual employees as per Medical Teaching Institutions Reforms Act (MTIRA), 2015.

“We demand of government not to do injustice with civil servants, who have spent years in building the institutions and even if their services are repatriated to the department, the budgets for the same will be also returned along with the positions,” he said.

He said that senior clinicians, who had been recruited in teaching hospitals as civil servants before enforcement of MTIRA, had already been stripped off their powers as they could not become chairpersons of their respective departments.

The PDA leader said that junior consultants employed under MTIRA had become chairpersons of departments and called the shots. “We want the government to let civil servants work in MTIs as per their experience and qualification,” he added.

He said that MTIs would be collapsed with repatriation of civil servants as they could not fill posts of experienced teachers immediately as it required decade of teaching experience to become a professor.

“There are also civil servants, who have been working in MTIs on high positions. The department should implement a policy regarding civil servants across the board,” he said.

Published in Dawn, Aug 1st, 2025