Syndicate’s elections turn the heat up at PU – VC’s ‘favourites’ shift loyalties

LAHORE – Some faculty members at the Punjab University (PU), who were allegedly ‘favoured’ by the PU Vice Chancellor Professor Dr Mujahid Kamran, have united against the PU VC in the varsity’s upcoming syndicate’s elections, Pakistan Today has learnt. The faculty members say that they will cast votes against the Teachers Front (TF), a pro-administration and pro-VC group.
According to some faculty member, the VC was asked several times to stop illegally favouring the teachers, who are now set to backstab the VC. However, majority of the teachers are supporting the TF as they appreciated VC’s performance by saying that the VC upgraded the research culture at PU and did well for the teachers’ welfare.
Syndicate’s election campaign is at its peak and on April 21, around 517 faculty members will cast their votes for the selection of four PU representatives; a professor, an associate professor, an assistant professor and a lecturer, for the syndicate. The elected representatives from these four categories will have the veto power in the decision-making process of the university. As a result, all the groups in the varsity are active in the elections to grab the coveted seats.
According to sources, Academic Group, a group of pro-JI teachers, and the TF were favourites for the elections, though the TF would suffer the ‘wrongdoings’ of the VC, who allegedly favoured some teachers, violating his own one-man-one-post policy, giving them important slots in the varsity.
A PU source said that the VC’s ‘most favoured’, Hall Council Chairman Dr Amin Ather and PU’s Employees Housing Society Chairman Dr Abdul Ghaffar, were now campaigning against the VC.
He said that the VC had favoured Dr Amin and Dr Ghaffar, making them the heads of their respective departments and giving them official vehicles, and had also ‘spared’ the teachers from the Institute of Communication Studies (ICS) for their wrongdoings, but now all of them had turned against the VC. He said the ‘neutral’ faculty members were annoyed at the VC for making a ‘less senior’ Dr Ghaffar the chairman, ignoring a ‘more senior’ faculty member.
He said Hafiz Iqbal, a strong man in the election campaign who had been ‘favoured’ by the VC in the past and occupied multiple posts and cars, was also against the VC in the elections.
He said that Hafiz was especially coming from the US to cast his vote against the pro-VC group. He said that all the ‘corrupt’ teachers who were ‘spared’ by the VC were even planning to start an anti-VC movement after the syndicate’s elections. A PU faculty member said that only those teachers would vote for the pro-administration group who want to see Dr Kamran as VC for another term. He said that though some teachers were appreciating the VC for compelling teachers to complete their PhDs, the onus was still on the VC to compel teachers to vote for the TF and clarify his neutrality, justifying Dr Ghaffar and Dr Amin’s ‘wrongdoings’.
He said that majority of the JI candidates were protecting their ‘corrupt’ teachers and could support the TF.