According to an official notice issued on Friday, three points on the agenda for Punjab University’s syndicate meeting on Saturday [today] are related to Institute of Communication Studies (ICS) former director Ahsan Akhtar Naz, who is facing a 90 day suspension on misconduct charges.
“Naz may be terminated,” a PU professor on an administrative post told The Express Tribune.
Charges against Naz include misconduct, sexual harassment and involvement in irregular and illegal activities also involving Dr Mughees ud-Din Sheikh, the former ICS dean.
“A sexual harassment application has been filed against Dean Zakria Zakir but he remains on the job….plots are being hatched to terminate Naz because he refused to oblige the vice chancellor in certain cases,” another member of the syndicate said.
The member shared a copy of Naz’s reply to the allegation reply with The Express Tribune, which states:
“The VC removed me from the post of ICS director, on January 21, 2013.
Two female contractual employees filed two applications against me on the same day January 10, 2013. One ad hoc female lecturer Ms Shafia Bhatti levelled the charge of loose talk at the ICS faculty meeting.
However, five senior faculty members including four assistant professors and a lecturer submitted a letter to the VC holding me innocent and called Ms Bhatti’s application baseless.
Azka Shahid, an assistant news producer in PU FM Radio, has accused me of ‘sexual harassment’ without any evidence.
It is noteworthy…that [she] had similarly accused Prof Mugheesud-Din Sheikh (then dean) and me in 2010. However, after an inquiry, the then Pro VC had declared me innocent and Azka Shahid had written a letter saying she was pressured by a group of people to file the baseless application against me.”
Naz has also raised questions about the way the inquiry committee was formed the harassment charges alleging that people on the committee were biased against him. “I demand that the inquiry should be conducted by a committee of senior most professors headed by a retired judge of the honourable Lahore High Court,” Naz said. Naz has also questioned the impartiality of another inquiry committee headed by Hafiz Mehmood Akthar under the PEEDA Act. He says that the irregularities charge was against a group – Mugheesud-Din Sheikh, Naveed Iqbal (lecturer), Shaifq Kamboh (lecturer) and him.
“This inquiry was first conducted by Prof Amin Athar and Prof Khan Ras Masood who was junior to Mugheesud-Din Sheikh. Sheikh objected to this and did not appear in the inquiry. No committee was constituted for fact finding….The recommendations of this incomplete and unlawful inquiry are illegal,” Naz said.
“The committee had recommended termination of both Dr Naz and Dr Sheikh but the latter retired and was given a safe exit…Now the inquiry is being used against Naz,” the syndicate meeting member said.
Published in The Express Tribune, April 20th, 2013.