Lahore High Court (LHC) Justice Sheikh Azmat Saeed on Thursday put off until May 27 the hearing of a petition challenging appointment of eight Punjab Education Foundation (PEF) directors.Assistant Advocate General Iftikharur Rehman and PEF lawyer Uzma Saeed requested the court to give time for filing reply. Petitioning lawyer Azhar Siddique opposed the request.The petition was filed by Muhammad and Ahmad, a public interest litigation firm, pleading that the PEF directors were appointed on a political basis ignoring merit. They said the PEF was set up under PEF Act 1999, which was dissolved later and PEF Act 2004 was incorporated which led to the dissolution of PEF. The petitioner said according to Section 5 of the new constitution a board comprising seven government and eight non-government directors should be constituted to run the affairs of the foundation. The petitioner said that the Punjab government appointed on March 8 six government officers on the seats reserved for non-government directors in violation of rules. The petitioner pleaded with the court to declare the appointments in question illegal.
