PESHAWAR, March 21: Ad hoc appointments in various academic departments, and to some administrative posts in the University of Peshawar have deprived deserving candidates of applying for jobs in the university.

Fresh candidates are dismayed at this “novel” procedure adopted to fill vacancies in the university through these temporary appointments.

Data collected from the university establishment shows that ad hoc appointments exist in almost every department, in violation of the Supreme Court verdict of June 13, 2001, in which the apex court had termed ad hoc appointments illegal and a tool of favouritism.

Official sources said that instead of advertizing the vacancies in the print media, authorities concerned had made it an instrument of receiving kickbacks and promoting incompetent lot. Actually, most of the ad hoc appointments were made by telephones, the sources claimed.

Some ad hoc teachers, when contacted, told Dawn : “The nature of these appointments has changed, as now the candidates are required to appear in the written, demonstration and oral tests before the selection board.” They were not paid any remuneration during the summer vacations, they added.

As a rule, the ad hoc appointments are made only for six months, after which the contract lapses, and requires to be renewed.

The teachers said the renewal of the ad hoc contract took almost two months, and that its renewal also depended on the goodwill of selection committee chairman and senior teachers of the department concerned.

Peshawar University Registrar Ajmal Khan said: “Ad hoc appointments are temporarily made in emergency situation. For the last couple of years, we have changed the criteria for making such appointments as the candidates are examined in written and demonstration tests as well as interviewed by a selection committee comprising the dean of the faculty, two senior faculty members and two experts from outside.”

When his opinion on the Supreme Court judgment sought, he said these, in fact, were not ad hoc appointments as such, but an engagement of the competent students on contract for a period of six months.