The Pakistan Medical Association (PMA) said in a statement on Wednesday the post of the Institute of Public Health (IPH) dean is neither sanctioned nor budgeted.
The statement added that the Punjab Health Department was either “incompetent” or “ignorant” as it was advertising that it was hiring for the post. It said the department wanted to award a “blue-eyed” candidate a post with a salary package of about Rs 0.5 million per month. PMA leaders, including Dr M Tanveer Anwar, Dr Izhar Ahmed Ch, Dr Shahid Malik, Prof M Ashraf Nizami, Dr Ehsan ur Rehman, Dr Yasmin Ehsan, Dr Sabahat Habib Khan and Dr Salman Kazmi condemned the incompetence of the Health Department and said it was against the government policy to shift to the regular mode of appointment from the contract mode. The statement alleged that the bureaucracy was destroying the institutions by providing incorrect facts and figures to the chief minister.
It said the IPH has 9 sanctioned posts for professors, at which only 4 are working in closed cadre. According to the law one of the IPH professors should be assigned as the dean. However, the health department appointed a regular associate professor as the dean. The PMA office-bearers demanded that the chief minister take notice of the health department’s “irregularity” and to fill all the vacant posts. They also requested that the unjust transfer of Dr Zulfiqar Baig, an M Phil program student, be reverted immediately.
