Performance audit of AWKUM stayed further

PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Tuesday extended the stay order restraining a private firm from conducting performance audit of the Abdul Wali Khan University Mardan (AWKUM) on the directives of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government.

A division bench comprising Justice Yahya Afridi and Justice Roohul Amin Khan extended the stay order. It restrained till May 5the Deloitte Chartered Accountant, Islamabad, a private firm, from conducting performance audit of the university.

During the hearing, Additional Advocate General Waqar Ahmad informed the bench that the provincial government had not submitted reply in the case and sought more time for submission of reply.

The court passed the orders in a writ petition by AWKUM, which it had filed against the audit of the university.

Counsel for the university, Rahmanullah Shah, submitted before the bench that the performance audit of the university was being carried out by the Higher Education Commission, Islamabad each year and evaluations are being published online on the website of the commission for general public throughout the world.

He submitted that since establishment of the university, regular audit is being carried out by the relevant authorities. The lawyer pointed out that audit of the university had been carried out under Section 38 of the Universities Act 2012, which provided a procedure for the audit and accounts.

The university claimed in the petition that the provincial government proposed amendment to the act in 2012 and resultantly, the amendments were made to Section 38 of the act in early May 2015, whereby two provisions were added after sub-section 6 of Section 38 of the act.

It said that after the amendments, the secretary Higher Education through a notification issued on May 29, 2015 asked the university for the performance audit through Deloitte Chartered Accountant, instead of regular audit of the university.