KARACHI, May 27: The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan has started investigations into a professor’s complaint of alleged gender discrimination against the top hierarchy of the Federal Urdu University of Arts, Science and Technology.

“Yes, we have received a complaint from a professor of the FUUAST and have started investigations into it,” Abdul Hayee, an HRCP official, told Dawn.

In her complaint, Dr Aniqa Naz, a former professor in the university’s pharmaceutical sciences department, alleged that some top university officials harassed her and forced her to resign.

She complained that the officials set hurdles in her duties and presented a misleading letter about her in the ninth meeting of university’s syndicate. She said they accused me of misconduct. She said the contents of the letter were so abusive that the syndicate decided to omit them from the minutes of the proceedings. She said the syndicate decided termination of her services on the grounds that her topic of PhD was not related to the courses she was teaching.

“Ironically, the teachers who replaced me possessed PhD or MPhil degrees as I had. They made such discrimination as I was a female teacher having a progressive view of education,” she said.

She said she resigned forthwith when she thought her family life might get disturbed due to ‘false and concocted’ accusations.

Dr Naz requested HRCP officials to intervene and investigate against the gender bias committed against her.

Prof Asghar Ali, one of the syndicate members, denied the allegations and said the case had nothing to do with any discrimination as her contract was terminated by the syndicate through lawful means.

However, Sulaiman D. Mohammad, a former member of the syndicate, said he had protested against the accusations leveled against the teacher and got such objectionable remarks expunged from the minutes of the proceedings. “She was certainly discriminated against,” he said.

The university’s in-charge vice-chancellor, Dr Kamaluddin, was not available on phone for comments.