academic staff Federation criticized to Higher education budget reduction
LAHORE:THE Federation of All Pakistan Universities Academic Staff Association (FAPUASA) has criticised the government for a substantial reduction in allocation of funds for higher education in the budget and termed it “a move to ruin research culture in universities.”
The federation is planning to hold of a protest over the cut to make the rulers realise the worst impact of slashing the budgetary allocation for the Higher Education Commission (HEC) and it was likely that universities across the country would observe protest on June 8 or 9.
Talking to The News, FAPUASA President Prof Dr Maher Muhammad Saeed Akhtar, who is also president of the Punjab University’s Academic Staff Association (PUASA), said the decrease in HEC’s budget from over Rs 22 billion to Rs 15.7 billion had exposed the federal government’s anti-education policy. He said research played an important role in development of any country, adding that owing to the focus on the higher education over the years the research culture had increased manifold in the country.
“We salute Dr Attaur Rehman and his team who played a significant role in promoting research culture in the country,” he maintained.
Dr Maher said the FAPUASA chapters across the country were worried about the substantial cut in HEC budget and they would hold a massive protest against the move in the coming days.
Expressing concerns over the cut in HEC’s allocations in PSDP 2010-2011, vice-chancellors (VCs) of various universities also criticised the move and termed it a result of the government’s indifferent attitude towards the higher education.
University of Engineering and Technology, Lahore, VC Lt Gen (r) Muhammad Akram Khan said the sudden and substantial cut would definitely affect the universities, adding that it was also feared that many schemes would have to be stopped “and when a scheme is stopped a massive loss is faced both in terms of money and time.” He said the sudden cut would disturb plans of universities.
“We understand the financial constraints of the government but the sudden and considerable cut has exposed that higher education is not priority of the government,” he maintained.
The UET VC said that in future, universities would also be reluctant to send faculty to foreign countries for PhDs.
Lahore College for Women University (LCWU) VC Prof Dr Bushra Mateen said universities in initial years of development, like LCWU, would suffer a lot. She said the construction work would stop and payment issues would crop up. She said fundraising was a difficult job for universities when even self-finance programmes were not allowed. She was of the view that big universities might cope with the cut but new universities would be facing a lot of problems owing to the cut in HEC’s funding.
She also mentioned the problems likely to be faced by the university’s faculty doing PhDs abroad and those who were supposed to do the same in future. University of Veterinary and Animal Sciences (UVAS) VC Prof Dr Muhammad Nawaz said the rate of development in livestock was phenomenal as mentioned in the economic survey 2010, adding, “However, if we are not going to invest in this, its going to suffer.”
He said the UVAS had developed many facilities at its Ravi Campus and owing to the cut in allocations for the HEC was going to have negative effects on the campus as the university would be unable to shift its students there in absence of laboratories, libraries, hostels, etc.
Dr Nawaz also expressed concerns over the slogan of self-sufficient universities, saying that there were few fund-generating opportunities for new universities as compared to big universities. THE NEWS
