Federal varsities, HEC get lion’s share in budget

ISLAMABAD: Around two third of the development budget for higher education has been given to federal universities and Higher Education Commission (HEC) while only 36% of the uplift fund have been allocated for all four provinces, the budget document has revealed.
According to Public Sector Development Programme (PDSP) 2015-16, 57 new projects worth Rs4577 million have been included in the upcoming budget for HEC but majority of the projects have been approved for federal universities and the commission’s own schemes.
Out of the total allocated amount for development schemes, federal universities will get 24.57% share while Sindh would receive only 2.7%, Punjab 10.5%, Balochistan 5.57% and KP would get 18.13%. Around 39.10% allocations of PSDP budget were made for HEC’s own supervised projects.
Interestingly, among all four provinces, KP got the highest share of PSDP higher education allocations with Rs830 million for its 9 new schemes. One project belonging to Nowshera, the hometown of KP CM Pervez Khattak will get Rs500 million allocation while rest of the eight projects will jointly receive Rs330 million.
The federal capital with 24 public sector universities will get 14 new projects worth Rs1125 million while Punjab will get only 9 new projects worth Rs482 million despite having the same number of universities. Only two projects have been included from Southern Punjab. The province of Sindh has 19 public universities and it will get only four new projects worth Rs95 million under PSDP 2015-16. Balochistan will get six new projects worth Rs255 million while HEC will receive Rs1790 million for its 15 new schemes.
Out of total 57 new projects, only one project (School of dentistry, Shaheed Zulifiqar Ali Bhutto Medical University) is approved, three are under process and 53 schemes are un-approved.
According to the higher education experts the higher number of unapproved project means it is less likely that all the PSDP allocation for the next year is consumed within the fiscal year. During the ongoing fiscal year (2014-15) 54 projects are mentioned in PSDP but only 26 projects have been included among the approved projects and would get funding among the ongoing schemes.
A close examination of the PSDP schemes shows that focus has been on development projects for the universities situated in major cities of Pakistan including Islamabad, Karachi, Lahore and Peshawar and the institutions situated in far flung areas could not get sufficient funds.
When contacted, the Chairman HEC Dr Mukhtar Ahmad said that majority of the projects executed by HEC were meant for entire Pakistan and all the four provinces will benefit from them. He said that a holistic view of the PSDP scheme for next financial years showed that remote areas of Pakistan would also benefit from the new schemes as HEC had proposed scholarship programmes for students of entire Pakistan.
Dr Mukhtar said in PSDP Rs100 million had been allocated for a project named “strengthening and upgardation of universities of backward areas.” Similarly, he said under a new scheme HEC was working on establishing university campuses in all districts of Pakistan. He said that HEC would complete 100 development schemes this year and the focus would be on other schemes from next year.
The HEC chairman said this year the schemes had been designed for the areas which did not get allocation last year to create a balance among all the areas of the country.