Urdu University: The HEC report became controversial due to wrong data on the appointments of teachers

Karachi: The debate over the appointment of teachers in Urdu University and their selection boards to be invalidated has made the Higher Education Commission’s report on the issue controversial.

The university’s identification of some of the figures included in the report as allegedly contrary to the facts has raised serious questions about the status of the report.

HEC had declared these recruitments as illegal in its report, however, in response to HEC’s report, Urdu University’s counter report was presented in the recent meeting of the university’s senate, in which it is stated that HEC in its report The enrollment of the university, the total number of teachers and the number of teachers appointed under the selection board have been misrepresented.

The selection board continued for four months in the presence of the HEC representative, he also accepted all the processes, but as soon as the chairman HEC was changed, an attempt was made to declare the selection board illegal in the presence of the head.

It is to be remembered that this reply report has come out in the recent meeting of the Senate chaired by the Chancellor of Urdu University and President of the State Dr. Arif Alvi. Another committee has been constituted to scrutinize the two reports and find out the facts related to the selection board which will submit its final report.

In this regard, “Express” has learned that the former administration of the retired vice chancellor of Urdu University presented the post-mortem report of the Higher Education Commission regarding the abolition of the teachers’ selection board in the recently held session of the Senate.

It has been revealed in the parawise reply issued by the university in response to the ongoing report by HEC that the data of the teachers appointed as a result of the selection board of 2021 has been presented by HEC in its report.

The HEC report says that a total of 235 teachers were appointed in which 6 teachers were appointed on undefined post while 89 were lecturers, 109 assistant professors, 21 associates and 10 professors.

On the contrary, the university says in its report that there is no undefined cadre while a total of 152 teachers have been appointed, including 61 lecturers, 68 assistant professors, 19 associates and 4 professors.

Similarly, the report of Urdu University says that HEC not only presented wrong data regarding the enrollment and number of teachers of the university, but also wrongly presented the total number of students and teachers of Karachi and Islamabad campuses.

In its report, HEC presented the number of students in Karachi campus as 10106 and in Islamabad as 4386 and presented the wrong total as 13606.

The response report of the university states that there are 14442 total students in Karachi and 4103 in Islamabad and the number of students of Urdu University is 18545, thus there are 263 teachers in Karachi while there are 98 in Islamabad and the total number of teachers is 361.

In this regard, when “Express” inquired from a senior teacher of Urdu University, he exposed the manipulation of these data and said that the HEC has to count those teachers from the selection board who are already ad-hoc because of their PhD. Assistant Professor Ben Crossey is drawing the salary of the post.

Appearing in the selection board does not make any difference to the salaries of these teachers on the payroll of the university, the number of such teachers was around 40.

The same senior teacher Kamzaid said that the investigation committee of HEC has also counted those people who were given offer orders but they did not join the university, the number of such people is also around 20, on this basis the data of HEC is wrong.

With reference to HEC data regarding enrollment and total number of teachers, the said senior professor said that perhaps the HEC committee hastily included only Karachi campus in the enrollment report and forgot that Islamabad campus also exists.

It should be noted that the HEC investigation committee included Vice Chancellor NED University Dr. Muhammad Tufail, HEC Director Coordinator Shah Zeib Abbasi, HEC Consultant Dr. Arshad Bashir, Regional Director Karachi Javed Memon and Federal Ministry of Education Joint Secretary Raja Akhtarqbal.

When “Express” asked HEC Chairman Dr. Mukhtar Ahmad about the claim of the former administration of the university for presenting wrong data, Tuan said that whoever comes to Pakkar says the same things, he said that I have not received the reply report of Urdu University. However, it is so important that now we have to make tough decisions regarding this university.

In response to the HEC report, when “Express” contacted the author of the written report, Professor Ziauddin, the former vice chancellor of Urdu University, Tuan said that the HEC team had come and we had shared the complete data with them. The data provided by us was not included in the report and the report was prepared contrary to the facts.

It is to be remembered that the HEC in its report had recommended to cancel the entire selection process, in response to which the university has taken a stand in its proposals included in the reply report that when the presence of the co-representative Dr. The committee has recommended the appointment of candidates, so there is no scope in the university law for any HEC committee to review the selection process.

This selection process has been approved by the university’s highest authority “Senate” on June 18, 2022. If there is any irregularity in it, it can be corrected again by the selection board.

It has also been said that when the representative HEC was involved in all the selection stages and no objection was raised by him in the appointment of the candidates and during the selection process which lasted for four months from May 2021 to August 2021, no objection was raised by the HEC. The objection did not come up and it is illegal to raise objections after one year of change and process of Chairman HEC.

In the HEC report, it has been said that there were selection boards of many departments in which one subject specialist participated instead of two. Because the quorum in the selection committee is 4 members in which a subject specialist can also participate and their participation is not mandatory.

It should be noted that Dr. A. Kumgal continued to participate in the selection boards organized by Urdu University as a representative of HEC. The decisions were made in the light of the documents submitted to the board.

The university administration has also supported that Dr. AQ Mughal was not only a part of the entire selection process but also gave marks to the candidates and signed all the recommendations of the selection committee.

It is noteworthy that the inquiry team of HEC in its report accused the selection committee of the university that some candidates were not given a chance to speak in the interview, they were asked barely one question and they were sent back within two minutes.

In defense of this allegation, the university administration has relied on the report of HEC and said that its representative of HEC has made it clear before the said committee that according to Dr. Mughal, the time given to the candidates in the interview depends on the candidate’s own abilities. Yes, if the answer to a basic question is known, the board does not ask it further.