PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court has issued a stay order to restrain the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government from acting against Abdul Wali Khan University Mardan vice-chancellor Professor Ihsan Ali until further order.

The order was issued by a bench consisting of Justice Syed Afsar Shah and Justice Mohammad Ibrahim Khan on Tuesday on a petition filed by Professor Ihsan against his possible forced retirement through the recent amendments to the KP Universities Act.

Similarly, the court also sought reply from the provincial government and Higher Education Department in the writ petition of Dr Ihsan Ali.

Prof Ihsan Ali insists Universities Act amended for his forced retirement

The petitioner’s lawyer, Arshad Ali, told the court that in order to commend services of the petitioner in the field of education, the previous ANP government in the province had extended his tenure as the Abdul Wali Khan University Mardan vice-chancellor until 2017.

He said his client had promoted the university up to the level of international standard but the PTI government in the province wanted to remove him from the post of the vice-chancellor.

The lawyer said the provincial government had made several amendments to the law to remove his client from the VC post.

He pointed out that first the provincial government had brought amendment in the KP Universities Act under which the tenure of vice-chancellor was reduced from four years to three years.

Arshad Ali said the provincial government had also passed some laws from the assembly through which vice-chancellor could easily be removed from the post of VC.

The lawyer said before amendments the syndicate of a university would inquire the matter if there was any allegation against him.

He said before amendments, the allegation would properly be conveyed to the vice-chancellor before his removal or forced retirement.

He said it seemed the recent amendments in 2016 were brought by the provincial government for removal of the petitioner before his extended tenure until 2017.

The lawyer said the provincial government had already sent two summaries regarding forced retirement of the petitioner from the VC post to the governor, but both were rejected as there was no law in place for forced retirement. He said the provincial government had however amended the law, under which he could be sent on forced retirement three months prior to the completion of the tenure.

The lawyer felt the amendment was made specifically for the forced retirement of his client as he had to serve as VC for further six months in the university.

After preliminary hearing, the court passed an interim order and restrained the provincial government from taking any adverse action against the petitioner until further order.

Published in Dawn, August 17th, 2016