Pakistan Council of Architects and Town Planners Ordinance, 1983

This 1983 Ordinance regulates who can practise as an architect or town planner in Pakistan by creating the Pakistan Council of Architects and Town Planners. Section 3 establishes the Council as a body corporate that can hold property, enter contracts, and sue and be sued. On its first constitution, Section 3(5) provided for a Chairman who must be an architect with at least fifteen years' experience, two Vice-Chairmen (one architect, one town planner, also with fifteen years' experience each), ten members (six architects and four town planners with at least five years' experience), and two further members representing architectural and town planning institutions - all initially nominated by the Federal Government, with a two-year first term.

Section 4 provides that after the initial period the Chairman and two Vice-Chairmen are elected by Council members from among themselves for two-year terms, and no one may serve more than two consecutive terms in these roles. Sections 5-7 set out the rules for the Council's annual general meeting and for extraordinary general meetings, which the Chairman must call within fourteen days of receiving a request signed by at least fifty members, or at any time he considers necessary; the general quorum for these meetings is fifty members (reduced to five for the Council's first meeting).

Section 8 lists the Council's core functions: maintaining two separate Registers (one for architects, one for town planners) plus lists of persons eligible to practise as unregistered practitioners; recognising architectural and town planning qualifications for registration purposes; removing and restoring names on the Register; setting standards of professional conduct; and assisting government and national institutions on architecture and town planning problems. Sections 10-15 deal with recognising qualifications from institutions within Pakistan and abroad (the Ordinance's First and Second Schedules list specific recognised foreign degree programmes, including from universities such as MIT, Princeton, Yale, McGill and several UK institutions for architecture and town planning), granting temporary licences, inspecting examinations, and withdrawing recognition where standards are not met.

Sections 16-19 cover maintaining the Register, the registration process itself, a right of appeal against refusal to register, and periodic revision of the Register. Sections 20-24 create a disciplinary mechanism for complaints against architects or town planners, through Tribunals of Inquiry with defined procedures and powers, plus a right of review. Section 28 provides for penalties and procedure for offences under the Ordinance, though the extract does not show the specific penalty amounts, and Section 30 extends certain of the Ordinance's provisions to unregistered practitioners as well.

This Ordinance has been amended at least in 1984 and 1994 (shown in the extract's footnotes), including changes to the length of the Chairman's and Vice-Chairmen's terms. Readers wanting the current, exact list of recognised qualifying institutions or specific penalty amounts should check the Council's current Schedules and any more recent amendments.