The apex decision-making body of the Quaid-i-Azam University (QAU) Syndicate in a fresh move approved on Sunday the long-delayed promotion of two faculty members and for investigating the matter, it has formed a committee to review promotions of two other faculty members. According to sources, the QAU Syndicate in its 173rd meeting chaired by QAU Vice Chancellor Dr Muhammad Ali Syed a day ago, ratified longstanding promotions of Dr Zafar Nawaz Jaspal and Dr Nazir Hussain from associate professor to professor. However, the Syndicate formed a committee to review the filed appeals by Dr Asif Ali and Dr Waheed Chaudhry. They both are faculty members in Mathematics Department and Anthropology Department respectively. Dr Zafar and Dr Nazir are serving in the School of Politics & International Relations while their promotions, as per well informed sources, were made affective from January 23, 2018 with seniority from January 2015. Sources added that that their promotions had been lingering since July 2015. After basic scrutiny, the promotional files of Dr Zafar and Dr Nazir were presented before the Selection Board of the university in 2015. The board vetted the cases accordingly. An official privy to the development, requesting not to be named, said that although both teachers were holding all required qualification and credentials, the previous VC Dr Javed Ashraf kept withholding their cases due to his alleged personal grudges against them. According to the Higher Education Commission’s (HEC) prescribed requirement for the appointment of a professor to any higher education university or degree awarding institute, a perfect candidate must have a PhD degree from a HEC recognised institution in a relevant field as well as 15 years teaching/research experience. Syndicate forms committee to review appeals by Dr Asif Ali and Dr Waheed Chaudhry Further, the candidate should have 15 research publications, including at least five publications in the last five years in HEC’s recognised journals. The Syndicate formed two-member committee comprising Allama Iqbal Open University VC Dr Ziaul Qayyum and Islamia College University VC Dr Habib Ahmed. The mandate of the committee was to review the appeals by Dr Asif and Dr Waheed. Dr Asif said in the appeal that the decision of Syndicate in its previous meeting for demoting him from associate professor to assistant professor over lack of publications was not legal. Dr Waheed was also reverted from assistant professor to lecturer in the same meeting. There were two different litigations in the case of Dr Waheed as when his reversion was presented in the varsity’s selection board, his demotion was declared illegal and it was decided to sustain his positions as assistant professor. Separately, Dr Waheed applied against two newly advertised posts of associate professor and professor in his department. However, he was rejected on the objection over deficiency of required publications for the post of professor. Dr Azam Khan was appointed as professor. At the time when Dr Waheed’s eligibility for the post of associate professor was being examined, the varsity’s Office of Research, Innovation & Commercialisation had notified that Dr Waheed holds 19 publications. Accordingly, Dr Waheed lodged a plea with this Syndicate that he fulfills the requirement for the announced posts while now Syndicate referred the case to aforementioned two-member committee to probe the matter. Besides this, as per sources, the Syndicate also constituted another committee to investigate the alleged unlawful promotion of Dr Mona Liza from associate professor to professor which was made in the previous VC’s tenure. The sources further revealed that the Syndicate also appointed Dr Gulraiz Akhtar and Dr Syed Aqeel Abbas Bukhari as Earth Sciences Department and Electronics Department chairmen respectively. Published in Daily Times, January 21st 2019.