HEC to get Rs79 bn as education budget up by 11pc

ISLAMABAD: The federal government on Friday announced allocation of Rs79.5 billion to the Higher Education Commission and Rs22.4 billion for vertical programmes in the health sector in the national budget for the year 2016-17.

Announcing the budget in the National Assembly (NA), Minister for Finance Ishaq Dar said that the allocation of funds to HEC is 11 percent more compared to the previous year 2015-16 and the highest-ever in Pakistan’s history.

Similarly, he said that during the fiscal year 2016-17, 122 new projects would be initiated under the funds allocated to HEC. During the fiscal year 2016-17, 39 new schemes would be launched by HEC for which purpose an amount of Rs21488.481 million would be spent out of the total allocation of funds in the budget .

Despite making 11 percent increase in budget for HEC, according to experts, the allocation is not sufficient enough compared to increase in needs and inflation rate. Even in the previous budget, not sufficient funds were allocated for developmental purpose because of which many old and new schemes were not carried out.

If the funds are not released, the situation will remain same and work on new projects will remain incomplete. In the meantime, the federal government also enhanced Rs2 billion for federal education sector in the budget for the year 2016-17 which means Rs73.2 billion has been earmarked for education this year compared to Rs71 billion last year fiscal year 2015-16.

For education affairs and services, an amount of Rs84,198 million has been allocated for the year 2016-17. Out of the total amount of Rs84,195 allocated to Education Affairs and Services, an amount of Rs8,197 million has been earmarked for Pre-Primary Education Affairs Services, Rs1009 million to Secondary Education, Rs63.593 million to Tertiary Education.

For Federal Education and Professional Training, the government has made total allocation of Rs2221.061 million, out of which Rs1495.541 million would be spent on uplift schemes while Rs725.220 has been earmarked for new developmental projects.