KARACHI: The Sindh High Court has issued notices to the vice chancellor of Karachi University (KU) and others on a petition filed by a visually impaired assistant professor of the Department of Urdu after the varsity rejected his promotion.

A two-judge constitutional bench of the SHC headed by Justice Adnan-ul-Karim Memon also put the advocate general of Sindh on notice for Aug 11 and directed the respondents to file comments till the next hearing.

Citing the universities and boards department, KU VC, registrar and chairman of selection board of the varsity as respondents, Dr Muhammad Sajid Khan has moved the SHC pleading to set aside the impugned order of the university about rejection of his promotion to the post of associate professor/professor (BPS-20/21).

The petitioner submitted that he was admittedly a visually impaired person and an assistant professor at the Department of Urdu with more than 17 years of teaching and research experience in his field and possessing 17 research papers.

Visually impaired assistant professor at Urdu Department tells SHC varsity intentionally not referred his dossier to international experts

He argued that he had applied for the post in response to a university’s advertisement published in 2019, but instead of considering the petitioner’s candidature the respondents had found him ineligible for consideration in December 2022.

Therefore, the petitioner also submitted that he had challenged the same before the SHC and in October last year, the high court had ordered the KU administration to reconsider the eligibility of the petitioner for promotion.

However, he further contended that the respondents again did not place his case before the selection board which culminated in contempt of court proceedings and thereafter, the respondents filed a so-called compliance report wherein they claimed that the petitioner did not possess the required publications in recognised journals.

The petitioner maintained that respondents have intentionally not referred his dossier to international experts as required under the law and the policy, which was basic requirement for placing the case for consideration before selection board.

He argued that the respondents have mala fidely overlooked 17 research papers possessed by the petitioner in recognised journals and non-consideration of such valid publications was an attempt to jeopardise the career of the petitioner.

He also stated that respondents have capriciously taken the petitioner out of race by declaring his research papers inadmissible besides the fact that all research papers were published prior to the 2019 advertisement.

The petitioner further contended the respondent varsity has misstated that journals in which petitioner has published research papers were no more available after January 2016 in the revised Advanced Studies and Research Board (ASRB) list as they have never mentioned in any advertisement that the list of approved journals was ever revised, it was only an attempt to keep petitioner away from elevating in career.

He asked the SHC to declare the impugned rejection order as illegal as well as violative to Higher Education Commission’s policy and set aside the same.

The petitioner also sought directives for the respondents to refer the dossier to the international experts for approval or otherwise and place his case before selection board for appointment against the post of professor (Urdu) under the HEC’s policy.

He further asked the SHC to restrain the varsity administration from taking any adverse action against him.

Published in Dawn, June 29th, 2026