Some candidates for VC posts to be re-interviewed

LAHORE

The vice-chancellor search committee has decided to re-interview some candidates for the coveted posts of vice-chancellors (VCs) for four public sector universities of the province, it is learnt.

The search committee, headed by noted industrialist and pro-chancellor of LUMS Syed Babar Ali, completed interviews on Saturday for which over 90 candidates were shortlisted in total. 

About 22 candidates were called for interviews on Saturday and four of them were interviewed via Skype since they were out of country including Dr Hafiz Muhammad Iqbal, former Dean of Education at Punjab University who was currently serving University of Dammam Saudi Arabia as professor.   

Sources privy to the developments said around 20 candidates were most likely to be interviewed again to finally shortlist a panel of three candidates for each university including Punjab University, Lahore College for Women University (LCWU), University of Sargodha and Muhammad Nawaz Sharif University of Engineering & Technology Multan. 

The ‘second’ phase of interviews of the further shortlisted candidates is most likely to take place on January13 or January 14 as some members of the committee have other engagements on January 11 and January 12. Once the committee finalises the panel for each university, a summary will be moved to the chief minister for a final decision and subsequent appointment order by the chancellor/governor. 

The sources also said the committee members observed to maintain the ‘highest’ level of secrecy while finalising the panel for each varsity and it was discussed that once the most suitable candidates were finalised, the VC search committee would itself draft the summary and hand over the same to the CM in person.

It is pertinent to mention here that other members of the search committee are Dr Ayesha Ghaus Pasha (Punjab Finance Minister), Dr Zafar Iqbal Qureshi of LUMS, Dr Mohammad Nizamuddin, Chairperson Higher Education Commission Punjab and Secretary Higher Education Punjab Irfan Ali. The search committee was notified in March 2015 for a term of two years.

The interviews for the four posts of VCs were started on January 6 and unlike previous practice of holding the interviews at Higher Education Department, this time the interviews were held at Government College University (GCU). 

When contacted, Secretary Higher Education Irfan Ali, who also acted as Secretary of the VC search committee, confirmed that re-interview of some of the candidates would be held next week adding the committee was exercising due diligence since office of the VC was very important. He also said the committee would most likely complete its task by the next week.