ISLAMABAD: A three-member bench of the Supreme Court of Pakistan will hear the case regarding the appointment of vice chancellors in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) universities on February 6. The bench will be headed by Justice Amin-ud-Din Khan.
The vice chancellor positions in 19 universities of KP have remained vacant for over one and a half years. The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government, led by KP Chief Minister Ali Amin Gandapur, has refrained from acting on the recommendations made by the caretaker government in February 2024.
The vice chancellor positions were advertised in 2022 during the previous PTI government, but interviews for potential candidates were not conducted, leading to the matter being transferred to the caretaker government.
After obtaining permission from the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP), the caretaker government completed the interview process and prepared panels of three candidates for each university.
During this period, three members of the Academic Search Committee (ASC) resigned, and the caretaker government replaced them as per routine to continue the process.
By the end of January 2024, the process was completed, but due to administrative snags, the file containing summary of the recommendations could not reach the Governor KP for his final approval.
Upon assuming power, the PTI government rejected these recommendations and, in July 2024, decided to re-advertise the positions and form a new ASC, which
included the same members except for one. However, some top-listed candidates challenged this decision in the Peshawar High Court (PHC) in August 2024.
The government argued to PHC that the ASC members substituted by the caretaker government were not legally appointed, as the ECP’s approval was mandatory.
The petitioners, however, contended that while the caretaker government had sought ECP permission to proceed with the vice chancellors’ appointment process, replacing a few members for a short 28-day period was a routine matter and did not require ECP’s approval.
