islamabad - Federal Ministry for Education, after a gap of five years, has finally appointed ten members of the Higher Education Commission’s (HEC) top decision making body, adding three officials who were included in the selection committee of the sitting chairman HEC, Wednesday.

However, the long-awaited appointments have been made on the recommendations made under the decision taken in ad-hacoism at HEC, instead of by forwarding the names after approval of the ‘commission’.

The notification issued said that the competent authority has been pleased to appoint following persons as members of the Higher Education Commission (HEC) members for a period of four years with immediate effect.

The names of the members include Dr. Sania Nishtar former federal minister, Dr. Shams Kasim Lakha, Lt. Gen (retd) Muhammad Asghar former rector NUST, Dr. Naveed A Malik rector Virtual University Lahore, Lt. Gen (retd) Asif Mumtaz Sukhera, former Surgeon General, Dr. Bhawani Shankar Chowdhry Professor Mehran University Jamshoro, Prof. Dr. Javed Iqbal Vice Chancellor, University of Balochistan, Eng. Ahmed Farooq Bazai VC Balochistan University of Information Technology, Engineering and Management, Ms Shehnaz Wazir  Ali, former Assistant to Prime Minister and Dr. Faisal Bari CEO and senior research fellow IDEAs and Associate Professor LUMS.  

HEC ordinance for the appointment of members said “In all sub-sequent appointments of the members specified in clause (a) of sub-section (2) the commission shall suggest a panel of three persons for each seat out of whom one may be appointed by the controlling authority not later than one month from the date of receipt of the names proposed by the Commission and the Controlling authority may not appoint any of the persons proposed by the commission and may seek a fresh proposal for suitable persons for appointment as members.

The chairperson and the members shall hold office for a period of four years and shall in no case be eligible for re-appointment for more than one similar term.

Dr. Sania Nishtar former federal minister, Ms Shehnaz Wazir Ali, former Assistant to Prime Minister and Dr. Faisal Bari were a part of the search committee formed for the selection of new chairman HEC.

A senior official at education ministry informed The Nation that HEC had a legal excuse for not taking action on its own Executive Director (ED) Dr. Arshad Ali who was facing the charge of plagiarism in his research paper.

Official said that now there will be no restriction for presenting the HEC’s ED before the commission, however a ‘friendly’ commission in majority can help him exonerating from the case.