High court restrains BISE chiefs from harassing private institutions

PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Monday restrained the chairmen of the Boards of Intermediate and Secondary Education, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa from ‘harassing and pressurizing’ private educational institutions to implement the government decision about conducting Grade-V and Grade-VIII examinations.

A division bench comprising Justice Lal Jan Khattak and Justice Abdul Shakoor restrained the chairmen of the boards for conducting the assessment and examinations till decision in the petition.

However, the bench directed the respondents including the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government through chief secretary, chairmen of Boards of Intermediate and Secondary Education and secretary Elementary and Secondary Education Department to submit reply before the next hearing. The bench issued directions in a writ petition filed by Private Education Network through Anas Takreem, secretary Media and Information, against the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government decision to conduct Grade-V and Grade-VIII examinations.

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government, secretary Elementary and Secondary Education, secretary Board of Intermediate and Secondary Education, director Academic Regulatory Authority BISP and Manager of Government Printing Press were made parties to the petition.

During the course of hearing, the petitioner’s lawyer, Abdul Sattar Khan submitted that the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government on April 14, 2017 circulated a notification to the private education institutions.

According to him, the notification said: “Government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has been pleased to approve assessment/exam for Grade-V and Grade-VIII with effect from the academic year 2017-18. All students of Grade-V and Grade-VIII of public as well as private educational institutions in the province shall appear in the assessment/exam to be conducted by the concerned Board of Intermediate and Secondary Education or as the case may be.”

The lawyer submitted that the petitioner institutions were carrying out assessment of the students on the basis of internal examination and were awarding them certificates. He added that the notification had not been published in the official gazette to-date and thus had no legal value or binding force in view of clause-41 of Section 2 of the West Pakistan General Clauses Act 1957.

Under the present law, he argued, a board shall have the power to organize, regulate, develop and control only the intermediate education and secondary education.

In the grounds to the petition, it was submitted that the province of Punjab where it was decided to improve the examination system of elementary education, the government of Punjab promulgated “The Punjab Examination Commission Act 2010” and a regular system was introduced for designing, developing, implementing, maintaining, monitoring and evaluating elementary education.

It was submitted that the existing system of examination in case of elementary education cannot be changed without proper legislation. The notification in hand was termed against the protection enshrined by the Constitution of Pakistan. It was prayed that the court declare the provincial government notification illegal and against the law.

Meanwhile, the Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Monday admitted a writ petition for a regular hearing in which candidates for the posts of civil judges had challenged interview for the posts.

A division bench comprising Justice Lal Jan Khattak and Justice Abdul Shakoor admitted the writ petition.

The petition had been filed by eight candidates against the Public Service Commission. They had passed the written examination for the civil judges with high marks but failed the interview.

However, the bench declared that in the light of Supreme Court judgment, the writ petition is maintainable as the respondents had raised the objection that the writ was not maintainable.

The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government had recently appointed more than 100 civil judges and they are now performing judicial work at various districts of the province.

Naveeda Naz and seven other candidates had challenged the interviews conducted through Public Service Commission for the posts after the written examination. The lawyers Abdul Latif Afridi and Sajeed Afridi appeared for Naveeda Naz in the petition.

The petitioners claimed in the petitions that the Public Service Commission did not follow the set rules for the interview of the civil judges posts. They claimed that the interview marks were given to the petitioners with the consent of one member and the marked numbers were aggregate.

As per the rules, they stated, all the six members of the interview panel would give separate marks. In this unlawful way, the petitioners claimed, the candidates, who had got high marks in the written test were failed in the interview.

However, the Public Service Commission, in the written comments, defended the aggregate marking in the interview, claiming that the commission had the power to award aggregate marks to the candidates in the interview.

The bench fixed August 23 for regular hearing after declaring the petitions filed against the interviews for the posts of civil judges.