The removal of the Dr. Banuri has highly been welcomed inside HEC as well as the academia
“The sinner sins against himself; the wrong-doer wrongs himself, becoming the worse by his own actions”.Having read some praise-worthy and sympathetic letters in favour of Dr. Tariq Banuri and blaming others for ousting him, persuade one to paint the other side of the picture too.
Back in 2018, out of the four candidates, Dr. Banuri was at number 4 recommended by a Search Committee, headed by Syed Baber Ali, owner of LUMS, don’t know his credentials as an academician, Ms. Shahnaz Wazir Ali, President SZABIST, Dr. Faisal Bari, Associate Professor at LUMS (who obviously could not go against his employer) and ………. Dr. Tariq Banuri,who was 65+ years old despite clear government instructions about the age bar to be 65, was an American national but managed to conceal not only this but also managed a case in Lahore High Court latter on by wasting HEC / public funds in a lavish manner. Besides these technicalities, prior to appointment as Chairman HEC, Dr. Banuri had never been an academic leader, had no noteworthy international eminence, and had no experience of running a local or foreign university. However, Dr. Banuri was a new hope for Higher Education (HE) sector and the country. Although, this write-up does not aim at contesting his intellect, as he might be a good teacher and researcher, but his profiles did not reflect him as an academic strategist to which he provided a precise and enough evidence during his 3 years tenure, leaving behind serious questions in internal governance as well as performance in HE Sector.
Peeping through his “integrity” or “meritocracy” in HEC, it can verified from the record of HEC that despite advertising the positions of Executive Director (ED) – who is Principle Accounting Officer and head of the secretariat of the Commission who is responsible for implementation of Commission decisions – Dr. Banuri did not let a full time ED be hired as he wanted to run the show through a fragile ad-hoc arrangement. The acting charge of ED office was given to Members from time to time as a stop-gap arrangement for more than two years, and finally the services of a grade 22 civil servant, who was an OSD, were acquired for ED office as an eye-wash, which is technically a wrong appointment as such. One of the beneficiaries of holding ED charge was the Member Commission, who once resigned but his resign was pushed under the carpet for ulterior motives, where in the dichotomy is that he is also a Consultant and on the payroll of HEC which is also a violation of HEC Ordinance. The said Consultant / Member Commission / Acting ED has been the key member of the Scrutiny Committee for ED who was himself enjoying the charge of ED, hence having conflict of interest. There are ample of evidences which prove Dr. Banuri to be a dictator and fascist in policy and decision making. Fictitiously, he had gathered a team of sycophants and blue-eyed Consultants around him just to perpetuate what he thought as fit, instead of developing a team of existing senior HEC officers with institutional history. The story of appointment of as many consultants as he wished is also a mock at the ideals of integrity, meritocracy and transparency. The relevant rules, framed by the Commission, have been amended by misleading the Commission in getting approved a policy for hiring consultant whereby the Chairperson has been authorized to appoint consultants in stark contradiction of the federal government rules. There has been no institutional process of neither amendment / improvement of rules/policies nor of selection of consultants. Dr. Banuri kept on appointing Consultants without any need assessment, on such salary package which reminded of the “Confessions of Economic Hitman” by John Perkins. Acquaintance to Dr. Banuri (particularly in USA) was the sole criterion to be a Consultant to him with no area of expertise, no tangible targets and KPIs. He used to even micro-manage the scrutiny and selection processes with a very narcissistic approach which may be verified from the record. He literally had imposed ban on fresh recruitment against vacant positions and promotions against the available positions reserved for promotion which resulted in a vacuum, with succession planning, which he tried to have filled with consultant – the “remedy” of everything. Even he did not allow to fill the vacant positions of PSDP PC-Is which delayed the deliverables of the projects.
Embarking upon the “Reforms” by Dr. Banuri, although, he remained indulged in internal so-called “restructuring” and “process-engineering” during three years which ended up in complete chaos, his two signature policies and the sum-product of his consultants, are namely (i) BS Undergraduate Policy, and (ii) Ph.D. Policy. Both the policies have not only been severely criticized but also rejected by the academia across the HE sector as well as the Commission members. The reasons of devastation in the sector could be enumerated as (i) he was biased and pre-occupied with his predecessors, earlier commission members and HEC officers &staff, and all previous policies as he used to openly comment that the work previously done by the Commission was “brainless”; (ii) he was a fascist allowing no argument and debate at all; (iii) he was of unilateral, arbitrary and narcissistic approach and was not appreciative of collective wisdom, rather was an arrogant person; (iv) he was not tailoring the local context and ground realities in policy making. Thus, his so called “reforms”, which in actual are “deforms”, have pushed back the HE sector in terms of quality, academic, research, development. Much could and would be authored in the days to come addressing the “deforms by Dr. Banuri” one by one in details which would unveil the cosmetics and optics. During his stay, he made no international collaboration, he could have not got enhanced the HEC budget, and isolated HEC which ultimately resulted not only in his removal but put the autonomy of the organization at jeopardy. He has nothing at his credit to showcase and admired.
Having said at all, the entire matter is required to be viewed through a very diligent lens, treating Dr. Tariq Banuri and HEC separately. The removal of the Dr. Banuri has highly been welcomed inside HEC as well as the academia and the width and breadth of HE Sector. However, at the same time, the autonomy of HEC being a thriving organization is a sine-qua-non for socio-economic uplift of the country. Removal of Dr. Banuri is a sigh of relief for HEC, Universities and HE Sector on one hand, it is hoped and on the other hand that the renaissance of HEC will take place provided that its autonomy is not cropped.
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