PHC moved to declare Edwardes College an autonomous institution

PESHAWAR: The faculty members of Edwardes College on Tuesday moved the Peshawar High Court (PHC) seeking an order to declare the college as an autonomous institution run by the Board of Governors.

The faculty members including Shakil Ahmad Nisar and Muhammad Jamal and 17 associate professors, assistant professors and lecturers of Edwardes College filed the petition through their lawyer Ali Gohar Durrani.

The Government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa through Chief Secretary, Higher Education & Archives Department, Secretary Higher Education, Finance Department through Secretary Finance, Board of Governors Edwardes College Peshawar, through its Chairman Governor Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Edwardes College Peshawar through its Principal and Bishop Humphrey Peters Dioceses of Peshawar were made respondents in the petition. The petitioners have challenged the action of Bishop Humphrey in alleged collusion with the Principal Edwardes College by setting up a rival Board of Governors in the college without any legal backing. They termed it illegal, unlawful, without any lawful authority and arbitrary to the rights of the petitioners. The petitioners prayed the court to declare the Board of Governors established by Bishop Humphrey illegal, unlawful and without lawful authority. They also sought an order to declare that all decisions taken by the illegal board constituted by Bishop Humphrey as void-ab-initio and have no basis in law. It was explained that the Board of Governors of the college headed by the governor held the entire administrative and management control of the college. “All the appointments have to be routed through them,” it said, adding that the budget of the college has to be passed through the board as well. The board was the body that would even appoint the principal of the college. The board was the grievance redressal body of all the issues surrounding the college affairs. In short, it was the three branches of the government in respect of Edwardes College, wherein it was the competent legislative body, the executive, as well as the judiciary. It was explained that the college had even before the coming into action of the MLR-118, was given regular grant-in-aid from the provincial governments, however it came into the financial supervision of the provincial government in a completely dependent manner, whereby 25 percent of its budget for the running of its affairs were sanctioned through the provincial government.