ISLAMABAD, Dec 10: The controversy revolving around who should be manning the country’s higher education regulatory body finally landed in the Supreme Court.

Taking up the matter on Monday, a three-judge bench comprising Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry, Justice Ghulzar Ahmed and Justice Sheikh Azmat Saeed summoned the federal government and acting executive director of Higher Education Commission Qamar Zaman, who is also serving as the education secretary.

The chief justice expressed surprise over the replacement of Prof Dr Sohail Naqvi by the government when an HEC official submitted a document in which commission’s chairman Javed Laghari had asked Mr Zaman to immediately start the process of hiring a new executive director.

The chief justice adjourned the hearing for Monday with an observation that the court could have issued a stay order but avoided doing so since the HEC chairman had himself entrusted upon the acting executive director to initiate the process of appointment.

Advocate Anwar Mansoor Khan argued the case on behalf of what he called a concerned citizen instead of naming the petitioner who alleged that rules had been violated in the appointment.

The controversy was over the extension given by the HEC’s governing body in services of Prof Naqvi as the executive director for another term of four years in MP-I for a third time. Instead of approving it, the Establishment Division sent a letter to the HEC stating that it was a prerogative of the prime minister to extend the tenure in a senior post and that the commission had no authority to do it.