PESHAWAR: A Peshawar High Court bench on Monday stopped the administration of the Bacha Khan University Charsadda from taking adverse action against the university’s security head, who was recently held responsible by an inquiry committee for the terrorist attack on campus, which had left 18 people killed.

Justice Roohul Amin Khan and Justice Syed Afsar Shah also issued notice to the university’s administration asking it to explain position on a petition filed by the security chief, Ashfaq Ahmad, who challenged the issuance of a show cause notice to him by the university in accordance with the directives of the then acting governor and chancellor of the university, Asad Qaiser.

They ruled that no negative action should be taken against the petitioner until the next order.

The schedule of the next hearing will be announced later.

Asks university’s admin to explain position on show cause notice issued to him

Following the Jan 20 incident of terrorists attack on Bacha Khan University the provincial government had constituted a three-member committee including Peshawar Commissioner Dr Mohammad Fakhr-i-Alam, Mardan Regional Police Officer Saeed Wazir and Higher Education Special Secretary Ghafoor Baig. The said committee had recommended removal of vice chancellor as well as security in-charge from their posts.

The acting governor, Asad Qaiser, in his capacity as chancellor of the university had approved the recommendation of removal of the security in-charge, but had issued warning to the vice chancellor ‘to be more diligent in future.’

Advocates Abdul Lateef Afridi and Khalid Afridi appeared for the petitioner and contended that enough security arrangements were in place and the university guards had offered resistance when terrorists attacked the campus.

They said the university’s security personnel had engaged terrorists until the arrival of police and security forces otherwise the damages would have been much higher.

The lawyers said the inquiry committee constituted by the provincial government had recommended the removal of the petitioner prompting the then acting governor to approve that recommendation.

They said a letter was sent to the university’s vice chancellor by the higher education department wherein the decision of the chancellor was conveyed to the vice chancellor.

Lateef Afridi said in the light of that letter, the university’s administration had issued a show cause notice to the petitioner asking him why he should not be removed from service.

He added that the petitioner had submitted reply to the said show cause notice and it was expected that he might be removed from service in near future.

The lawyer said the officials, who were responsible for providing security to the university and who should be questioned for how the terrorists had reached the university, were instead appointed inquiry officers.

The counsel also produced the copies of statements of the Inter-Services Public Relations and federal and provincial governments hailing security officials of the university for bravely retaliating the attack.

They also showed the court the letters of commendation sent to the university by different authorities.

The counsel said the provincial government and the police had tried to pass the responsibility of negligence to the university internal security instead of the law-enforcement agencies.

They also contended that the acting governor could not act as chancellor of the university and his appointment was made specifically to do the day-to-day responsibilities of the governor.

Published in Dawn, March 15th, 2016