ISLAMABAD, July 12: The third committee investigating the misappropriation of Allama Iqbal Open University’s (AIOU) library funds will present its report at an AIOU Executive Council meeting on Saturday, sources told this reporter.

The committee was formed by the authorities in December 2001 under the chairmanship of Ishtiaq Ahmed of University Grants Commission (UGC).

The financial irregularity was pointed out by the first of these inquiry committees in a July 2001 report.

A second inquiry committee was then formed to nominate officials involved in the scandal and as a result of its findings, Librarian Zamurd Khan, Assistant Librarian Jan Mohammad Charn and Superintendent Mohammad Arif were suspended.

The third inquiry report available with this reporter observed that extraordinarily heavy purchases including outdated editions of extremely expensive encyclopaedias from a shop called Book Ocean which was not even registered with the Ministry of Education indicated underhand deals or involvement of people with vested interests.

For instance, the dean of the Faculty of Science, Prof Parveen Liaquat, purchased outdated CD ROMs from Book Ocean for Rs424,678 without verifying the much lower market price. The deal was transacted verbally in violation of the varsity rules.

It is worth mentioning here that over the last couple of years, 85 per cent of the purchases were made at Book Ocean.

The report was also critical of the AIOU accounts department, saying that payments of hundreds of thousands of rupees to Book Ocean had been processed in a matter of days without any objections.

For the last three years, Prof Liaquat had been selecting books for each department in her discretion — without consulting the concerned department. She also overstepped her authority in organizing book exhibitions for her favourite bookseller.

Considering the instrumental role of Prof Liaquat in the misappropriation of funds, the committee has recommended that the competent authority may constitute a high-level committee comprising members of the executive council to investigate the issue.

The AIOU Executive Council comprising distinguished professors of top universities of the country will take the final decision in this regard in its July 13 meeting.

The records show that the professor in connivance with the concerned library officials and the Islamabad-based bookseller bungled the library budget for the last three years which amounted to more than Rs10 million.

Despite the formation of three inquiry committees, no conclusive decision has been made so far due to the influence wielded by the alleged beneficiaries.

Dr Liaquat, who was also nominated in the second inquiry report along with the three library officials, is still working as the dean of science faculty. She is the wife of Liaquat Hussain who heads the AIOU data processing unit.