LAHORE: The Lahore High Court (LHC) on Thursday reserved its verdict on the petitions challenging the central induction policy, which authorised the University of Health Sciences (UHS) to conduct the admissions for private medical and dental colleges of Punjab.

Several private medical and dental colleges had challenged the policy before the court.

Advocate Ashtar Ausaf, on behalf of the private colleges, argued that the provincial government had enforced an unlawful policy and empowered the UHS to conduct the admissions.

He pointed out that in the past the Pakistan Medical and Dental Council (PMDC) was authorisedto conduct the admissions.

The counsel stated that the government had adopted an unlawful process to impose the impugned policy without taking the stakeholders (private colleges) into confidence. He asked the court to set aside the central induction policy for being unlawful and restore the old procedure of admissions under the control of the PMDC.

Opposing the petitions, a law officer stated that the provincial government formulated the impugned policy under the PMDC Act 2022. He said the government introduced the policy to ensure merit and transparency in the admissions to the public as well as private medical colleges.

He claimed that the majority of the private colleges endorsed the government`s policy and askedthe court to dismiss the petitions for being not maintainable.

After hearing the arguments from both sides, Justice Ali Bagar Najafi reserved his verdict in the petitions.

DISMISSED: The Supreme Court dismissed the government`s appeals against the promotion of 44 junior clerks of the Punjab Education Department.

The employees had been promoted against 20pc promotion quota under the Punjab Civil Servant Act 1974; however, the deputy commissioner of Bahawalnagar, being the administrator of the District Education Authority, took action on a complaint and got the matter investigated through an inquiry committee. The committee recommended withdrawal of the promotion.

The DC passed an order andwithdrew the promotion. The aggrieved employees filed a petition before the LHC, which suspended the impugned orders of the DC.

The Punjab Service Tribunal also declared the DC`s orders as illegal and upheld the promotion of the junior clerks. The government challenged the tribunal`s order before the apex court.

Representing the aggrieved employees before the Supreme Court, Advocate Hafiz Tariq Nasim argued that the service tribunal had lawfully set aside the DC orders.

He said the DC had no power to investigate the promotion of the employees.

The Supreme Court, after hearing both sides, dismissed the appeals that assailed orders of the Punjab Service Tribunal.