PESHAWAR: The University of Agriculture Peshawar has laid off 252 employees in light of the Supreme Court’s judgement over their irregular recruitment in the last one decade.

Also, 318 staff members were reverted to their previous grades over “illegal” promotions, sources told Dawn.

They said out of the sacked employees, 40 held the basic pay scale-18, six BPS-17 and the rest BPS-16 and below.

The sources said in the last one decade, the university “unnecessarily” recruited a large number of employees in violation of the Higher Education Commission’s criteria causing serious financial troubles.

318 staff members reverted to previous grades over illegal promotions

They said the UAP’s 247 teaching and 847 non-teaching employees were employed in violation of the HEC criteria that set their recruitment ratio at 1-1.5.

The sources said under the criteria, the university should have recruited 360 non-teaching staff against 247 teaching staff but the previous vice-chancellors recruited 477 extra non-teaching employees.

They said the university’s current budget deficit totalled Rs1 billion.

Sources said the relieved 252 employees were irregularly recruited on contracts from time to time but they were regularised by the Peshawar High Court on their request in 2019.

The sources said those employees were paid millions of amount as they were considered regularised from the date of their appointments.

They, however, said the university later challenged the Peshawar High Court verdict in the Supreme Court that set it aside lately.

“With the termination of 252 employees, the university will get a relief of Rs300 million annually,” a source told Dawn.

When contacted, UAP Vice-Chancellor Prof Jehan Bakht confirmed the removal of employees saying the move comes as the university implemented the Supreme Court verdict on the matter “in letter and spirit in its larger interest.”

“It’s a landmark decision of the Supreme Court that will enable us to run administrative and financial affairs in a transparent and lawful manner,” he said.

A senior staff member of the university told Dawn that currently, the UAP faced a serious financial crisis, so it was struggling to pay the pension of retired employees in the previous month, while it could pay salary to its employees.

He said the UAP might not be able to pay salaries and monthly pensions for the month of February.

Meanwhile, the UAP employees demonstrated against the sacking of their colleagues.

Addressing them, Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz election candidate for PK-80 Haider Bacha said the university’s vice-chancellor and registrar should withdraw the move until Monday otherwise they people of Khalil tribe would protest it on the University Road.

He is contesting the upcoming general elections from the area inhabited by the Khalil tribe. Majority of the laid off employees belong to that tribe.

“First the University of Peshawar terminated 600 Class-IV employees and now, the UAP has made hundreds of their tribesmen jobless. We will set the VC office on fire if he doesn’t withdraw the termination decision. We won’t let you and your children live on,” he warned.

Commenting on those life threats, the VC said he had reported the matter to the police, higher education department, intelligence agencies as well as the governor, who is also chancellor of the province’s public sector universities.

Published in Dawn, February 4th, 2024