Latest news with #SearchCommittee
Express Tribune
23-06-2025
- Politics
- Express Tribune
Quality assurance panels to monitor projects
WASA workers pump out rainwater accumulated at Committee Chowk in Rawalpindi. PHOTO: EXPRESS/FILE The Punjab Housing, Urban Development and Public Health Engineering Department has established Quality Assurance Committees in all key subordinate agencies and development authorities across the province. Official sources confirmed that these committees will operate within Water and Sanitation Agencies (WASAs), Parks and Horticulture Authorities, and Development Authorities. Their primary mandate is to monitor project execution, verify adherence to technical standards, and provide consistent feedback to improve ongoing and future development schemes. Each committee will include departmental engineers, quality control officers, and administrative staff to ensure a comprehensive review of project implementation. Reports from these committees will be regularly submitted to the Housing Department's central monitoring cell for oversight and any required corrective actions. This quality control initiative follows the earlier creation of a high-level Search Committee tasked with ensuring merit-based recruitment of top positions, such as Directors General, Managing Directors, and Chief Engineers. Chaired by Housing Minister Bilal Yasin, the committee evaluates service records and seniority to ensure that appointments reflect capability and integrity. Additionally, the department has established an Internal Accountability Board, operating under the Punjab Employees Efficiency, Discipline and Accountability (PEEDA) Act. This board will investigate complaints of corruption and misconduct within the department and its subsidiaries, enforces internal discipline, audits compliance, and advises on policy reforms. Commenting on the department's multi-layered reforms, Housing Secretary Noorul Amin Mengal said: "The Quality Assurance Committees are another critical step toward institutionalising excellence in public service. When combined with the Search Committee and Internal Accountability Board, we are creating a governance model rooted in merit, integrity, and public trust." He stressed the importance of responsible use of public funds, noting that billions of rupees are invested annually in housing and sanitation projects.
Wall Street Journal
17-06-2025
- Business
- Wall Street Journal
The NFL Rainmaker Who's Taking Over the PGA Tour
Over the course of several months, Tiger Woods and the PGA Tour's search committee heard dozens of pitches from candidates hoping to become the Tour's first ever chief executive. But the one that stood out came from someone with no experience in professional golf at all. They wanted to make the PGA Tour more like the National Football League.
Time of India
05-05-2025
- Politics
- Time of India
Government takes first step to overhaul recruitment body
Karnataka Public Service Commission The Karnataka government has taken the first step towards overhauling the(KPSC), an institution that has long been mired in allegations of exam malpractices, corruption, biased recruitment, and that real reform is impossible without transparency in the appointment of the Commission's Chairman and Members, the government has now constituted a Search Committee to oversee these appointments. This move comes as a long-overdue response to repeated recommendations and judicial in 2013, the PC Hota Committee had recommended the formation of a Search Committee to ensure merit-based appointments to the KPSC. In 2016, the Karnataka High Court, in the KR Khaleel Ahmad case, also ordered the government to establish such a panel, emphasising that transparency in leadership appointments was essential for restoring credibility and efficiency in the Commission. Despite these strong recommendations, successive governments failed to act. It was only after growing public criticism in recent months that the cabinet finally approved the formation of a Search Committee during its meeting on March 14 this newly formed committee will be headed by the Chief Secretary to the Government and will include five members. These members can include retired IAS officers who have served as Additional Chief Secretaries, former Secretaries to the Central Government, or retired directors from reputed national institutions such as IIMB, IISc, or IITs. The Secretary of the Department of Personnel and Administrative Reforms will serve as the member-secretary. This marks the first real step towards reform in over a decade, with the Hota Committee recommendations finally being implemented 12 years later, and the High Court order being acted upon after nine official order issued by the Department of Personnel and Administrative Reforms used the term 'Hudukaata Samiti' (Search Committee), but mistranslated it as 'Hudukaat Samiti' in Kannada — a term that sparked ridicule on social media for sounding colloquial and inappropriate. The original Hota Committee report, written in English, had referred to the panel as a 'Search Committee' or 'Broad-Based Search Committee.' Officials allegedly used Google Translate without cross-verifying the Kannada the KPSC main examination began on Saturday amidst confusion caused by the last-minute issuance of admit cards. On the first day, qualifying exams for General Kannada and English were conducted across 9 centres in Bengaluru and 8 in Dharwad. The turnout was reportedly high, with 93.3% of candidates appearing for the exams. Out of 5,424 registered candidates, including over 350 who received admit cards late following a court order, 389 candidates remained absent. The examination process went smoothly without any reported disruptions, according to KPSC sources.
Express Tribune
13-04-2025
- Politics
- Express Tribune
In a first, Sindh to launch performance audit of university VCs
The Sindh government has decided to conduct a performance audit of vice chancellors of public universities across the province, following a recommendation by the Sindh Higher Education Commission (HEC). This initiative marks the first time such a measure is being implemented in the academic history of Pakistan, including Sindh. The Chief Minister of Sindh, who also serves as the controlling authority for public universities in the province, has approved a summary submitted by the Sindh HEC titled "Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) for Senior Academic and Non-Academic Positions in Public Sector Universities." With this approval, the decision to conduct performance audits of key university officials, including vice chancellors, has taken immediate effect. From now on, the performance of vice chancellors will be directly linked to a reward and accountability system. According to the approved summary, the performance audit will not be limited to vice chancellors alone. Other key university officials-including pro-vice chancellors, directors of finance, deans of faculties, registrars, heads of departments, directors of ORIC and QAC, and controllers of examinations-will also be evaluated. Sindh HEC has developed specific KPIs for each of these positions, which have also received formal approval. According to details obtained by The Express Tribune, the Sindh HEC has shared this new monitoring and evaluation framework with the higher education authorities in the other three provinces as well as with the Federal HEC. This opens the possibility for other provinces and the federal body to adopt a similar system if they choose. It is worth noting that the Search Committee Act governing the appointment of vice chancellors in Sindh was passed three years ago. The Act includes a legal provision that allows the Search Committee to evaluate the performance of vice chancellors. The recently approved summary formalises this process, stipulating that the performance of vice chancellors and other key officials will be reviewed by the Sindh HEC and the Search Committee every two years.
Express Tribune
06-03-2025
- Politics
- Express Tribune
SHC stays appointment of board chairmen
The educational boards in Sindh, awaiting appointments of full-time chairmen for several years, are likely to continue functioning under the interim heads as the Sindh High Court has stayed the recent appointments of eight chairmen for the boards. The Hyderabad circuit bench on Tuesday put the respondents, including the Sindh government through the chief secretary, Sindh Universities and Boards Department and the Search Committee besides the eight chairmen, on notice for March 26. "Until the said date, the subject summary shall not proceed to the adversity of the petitioners," reads the order. The petitioners Abdul Jabbar Abbassi and Sikandar Ali Mirjat were candidates in the recruitment process. The former is an associate professor teaching English language, based in Hyderabad, and the latter is the chairman of the Board of Intermediate and Secondary Education, Larkana. A summary was moved with those eight names, besides one of Brig Syed Waseem Akhtar, to the Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah on February 3. But Akhtar's name in the shortlisted candidates stirred a reaction in the province because of his domicile of another province, prompting him to withdraw his candidature. "This is another instance which demonstrates that the recruitment process is a sham and based on nepotism and reeks of mala fides," the petitioners contended. The CM, on March 1, endorsed the eight names as recommended by the search committee for the appointment. The two petitioners hinged their case upon the contention that the search committee, which conducted the recruitment, acted out of its purview because its domain is confined to the appointments of the public sector universities' vice chancellors. Another argument, pleaded by BISE Larkana's chairman Mirjat, cited that none of the eight chairmen had prior experience of working in the educational boards of Sindh. He alleged that all the board employees with relevant work experience were ignored in the appointment process in violation of the court order. He recalled that the secretary boards and universities had given a verbal assurance in the SHC on December 13, 2024, stating, "In the cases where candidates with equal qualifications are available, preference would be given to those with experience working within the department." The petitioner pointed out that the same statement was made a part of the judge's order but the government respondents ended up allegedly flouting that order. There are seven educational and one technical boards in the province. The eight names recommended for the posts of the chairmen include Dr Asif Ali Memon, Ghulam Hussain Soho, Mansoor Rajput, Muhammad Misbah Tunio, Musharraf Ali Rajput, Dr Rafiq Ahmed Chandio, Khalid Hussain Mahar and Dr Zahid Ali Channar. They secured 56 to 59.4 scores in the recruitment process. The positions of chairman for the BISEs of Hyderabad, Sukkur, Larkana, Mirpurkhas and Nawabshah, as well as the secondary and higher secondary education boards of Karachi and the Sindh Board of Technical Education, were advertised in December, 2023. The petitioners prayed the court to declare the said appointments and the February 20 summary and its March 1 endorsement by the CM as unlawful. They also pleaded the court to restrain the notification of the appointments and to bar the selected candidates from acting in pursuance of the summary.
