Recruitment process for new VCs set in motion

PESHAWAR: After the one-year cut in the tenure of vice-chancellors of public sector universities, several of them would complete their term during the next few months and the Higher Education Department has already started the recruitment process by advertising the posts.
The Hazara University Mansehra and Kohat University of Science and Technology are being administered by acting vice-chancellors in the absence of the full-time heads and the process for filling those offices has already started. About 85 candidates have applied for the two offices and scrutiny of their applications is in progress.
“The scrutiny would be completed by mid-September,” an official at the Higher Education Department (HED) told The News. The provincial government, in the recently introduced Universities’ Act, has reduced the tenure of the vice-chancellors from four to three years and also implemented fresh and tougher eligibility criteria for the vice-chancellors.
Now the vice-chancellors would not only be professors of imminence with 20-year experience but also PhD degree holders. They also need to have published at least 40 research papers in reputed national and international journals with the impact factor 1 and above.
The impact factor is the hardest condition for most of the professors, especially those from the social sciences, to meet. Also, this is a factor that has drastically reduced the number of applicants for the two universities in Mansehra and Kohat.
This is the reason that the professors of social sciences were exempted from the impact paper in the recent advertisement for the vice-chancellors’ offices of University of Engineering and Technology, Peshawar and the newly established University of Swabi for Women even though no amendment in the act could be made.
The impact factor has now been specified for the candidates in the field of engineering, science and agriculture only. The advertisement reads: “A minimum of 40 research publications in peer-reviewed international research journals with impact factor of above 1 in the case of candidates in the field of agriculture, science and engineering.”
The position of vice-chancellor in the University of Swat has also been advertised now as the incumbent head there would complete his tenure after three months. According to an official of the HED, they need to start the recruitment process of new vice-chancellor six months before the completion of the tenure of the incumbent.
The Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI)-led provincial government has also announced establishment of two more universities, apart from the upgradation of the Swabi campus of Shaheed Benazir Bhutto University for Women. The proposed new such institutions are the Mardan Women University and Abbottabad University. But it would take a little more time to recruit vice-chancellors for those two varsities as their commissioning is still at very early stage, the official said.
The Awami National Party (ANP)-led previous government had set up a record 11 universities in the province during its five-year rule. However, the recruitment process for vice-chancellors and other staff during the ANP-PPP rule drew strong criticism. According to many, nepotism and favouritism was made the criteria in the vice-chancellors’ appointment and merit was violated.
The PTI government made several attempts to replace the current vice-chancellors with people of their choice. However, it couldn’t do so in the presence of the previous act for the universities. The provincial government has now amended the act and reduced the term of the vice-chancellors by a year.
A group of teachers had also moved the Peshawar High Court and challenged the appointment of the vice-chancellors, but their petition hasn’t been decided yet.
According to the new act, the incumbent vice-chancellor of UET Imtiaz Hussain Gilani, who served for the longest period in any university in the history of the province, is not eligible for the post. Some reports suggested that certain tough conditions inserted in the eligibility criteria for the vice-chancellor’s job were Gilani-specific.