Sindh High Court bars SPSC from conducting exams, announcing results, advertising posts

HYDERABAD (APP): The Sindh High Court on Thursday stopped Sindh Public Service Commission (SPSC) from conducting exams, announcing results or advertising posts until it adopts and apprise the court about steps to ensure transparency in its functions.

The Hyderabad Circuit Bench comprising justice Zulfiqar Ahmed Khan and justice Muhammad Saleem Jessar after hearing arguments of the the commission’s officers and counsel suspended the SPSC’s functions till the next date of hearing slated for May 27.

“No satisfactory answers as to the transparency of the process being adopted by the SPSC while testing and recommending a candidate for a particular post have been given neither by the counsel nor the chairman (Noor Muhammad Jadmani) or Controller (Hadi Bux Kalhoro),” reads the order.

The bench also recalled the previous orders of the supreme court and the SHC regarding the same issues which had not been enforced.

However, the officers argued that those orders were specific to those cases and that those were not supposed to be adopted as a permanent part of the Sindh Public Service Commission (SPSC)’s recruitment mechanism.

“They are taking a fresh start to bulldoze such orders,” the bench observed.
The SPSC’s counsel and officers sought time from the court for taking steps for bringing transparency in their functions and also to file a detailed report in that regard.
“Till such date no appointment, order, test, result, announcement or any other such act be done by the commission,” the bench ordered.
The judges also noted that an utter failure of transparency in the acts of the responsible officials had been witnessed and that neither rule of probity, fairness and good conscience was being followed as held in the judgments of the honorable supreme court.
The order has been given in a petition filed by Dr Asma Makhdoom’s counsel through her counsel advocate Sajjad Ahmed Chandio.
According to the petitioner, the SPSC conducted the written tests for the posts of BS-17 medical officers on December 9, 2018, after advertising the posts on July 19, 2018.
A month before the exams on November 14, 2018, the SPSC bifurcated the positions on the gender basis, keeping 1,337 for male medical officers and 446 for females.
As per the results announced in January, 2019, only 477 candidates qualified the written tests and 302 the interviews against the posts of the medical officers while 434 candidates against 446 posts of women medical officers qualified.
The petitioners claimed that for some 1,047 seats which had still remained vacant, the commission directly conducted interviews and declared 945 candidates successful on September 16, 2019, allegedly under political influence or nepotism.
At the last hearing on April 15, the SHC had issued arrest warrants for the commission’s chairman and suspended its secretary.