PHC petitioned against granting university status to medical colleges

PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Friday issued notices to the respondents on a writ petition challenging the upgradation of the Khyber Medical College Peshawar and Ayub Medical College Abbottabad to full-fledged medical universities.

A single PHC bench consisting of Justice Fazal Subhan heard the petition and issued notices to the respondents after preliminary hearing. It may be mentioned that the caretaker government recently announced to upgrade the Khyber Medical College Peshawar and Ayub Medical College Abbottabad to the status of medical universities.

The writ petition was filed by the Khyber Medical University Employees Association President Dr Brekhna Jamil through her lawyer Babar Khan Yousafzai Advocate. Her counsel told the court that the caretaker prime minister announced the upgradation of the two medical colleges at a ceremony in the Governor’s House in Peshawar on December 20. He said that later the provincial government promulgated an ordinance to upgrade the two colleges to the status of universities. Babar Khan argued that the government had neither prepared the PC-I nor fulfilled other formalities.

He said that the Board of Governors of the two medical colleges had not approved the upgradation. He said the approval of the Higher Education Commission and Election Commission of Pakistan had not been sought before the announcement. He pointed out that 47 universities in the country were facing financial crunch and turning the two medical colleges into universities would also create similar problems for them. He said the Higher Education Commission and the Finance Department had opposed the upgradation of the two medical colleges at the cabinet meeting.

He said that the announcement was made by the caretaker prime minister, who was not mandated to do so. He said that caretakers were supposed to run the day-to-day affairs of the government and to oversee the holding of the free, fair and transparent elections. He said that it was the prerogative of the elected government to make a policy. He contended that new universities should be created after addressing the financial issues.

After hearing the arguments, the court issued notices to the provincial government, Higher Education Commission, Election Commission of Pakistan, Finance Department and others.