SHC dismisses plea of contractual doctors seeking regular appointments

The Sindh High Court (SHC) has dismissed a petition of doctors, who were appointed on a contractual basis during the Covid-19 pandemic, seeking regularisation of their jobs in the Sindh health department.

The petitioners, Abdul Aleem Uqaili, and others had submitted that they were appointed on contractual basis during the pandemic and worked on different posts on an ad-hoc basis. Their counsel submitted that the high court had earlier directed the health department to refer the candidature of the petitioners to the Sindh Public Service Commission (SPSC) to assess their suitability for appointment on the subject posts by conducting their interviews only.

A division bench of the high court headed by Justice Mohammad Shafi Siddiqui after hearing the arguments observed that compliance was made by virtue of a press release issued on April 9, 2024 wherein some of the petitioners, as arrayed in the above referred petitions, were declared to have been passed. Those who were not declared/mentioned in the list presumably failed in the interview.

The bench observed that the petition was now filed with the argument that the SPSC had not adjudged the suitability of them through an interview in terms of the directions given by the court.

The SHC observed that the directions given by the court were only to the extent that SPSC may assess their suitability for the appointment via interview. The high court observed that the SPSC had conducted interviews and assessed the suitability of the candidates, which were adjudged accordingly and petitioners were not disclosed as successful.

The SHC observed that the court could not make a further probe in this regard since an earlier petition had been disposed of with certain directions, which had been complied with.

The high court observed that as far as the present failures were concerned, the court could not be a substitute of the SPSC and assume the role of an interviewing panel to adjudge the suitability of the petitioners for appointments. The SHC observed that no question of law for consideration of the court had been raised and dismissed the petition as not maintainable.