Commission to monitor private universities

LAHORE

Punjab Minister for Higher Education Syed Raza Ali Gillani has said the Punjab government will set up a commission to monitor the working of private sector universities of the province. 

He was talking to the media at the Government College University (GCU) where he chaired a meeting of Vice Chancellors (VCs) of all public sector universities of Punjab on Monday. Punjab Higher Education Commission (PHEC) Chairman Dr Mohammad Nizamuddin, PHEC director general Dr Shahid Soroya and officials of Higher Education Department attended the meeting.

The minister said commission on private universities would also monitor that if these universities were working according to their charter. He said a meeting of rectors and VCs of private universities of the province would also be called soon. 

Syed Raza Ali Gillani went on to say that there was no ambiguity that higher education was a provincial subject after the 18 the constitutional amendment.

He added the performance of universities would be made result-based so that this sector could produce best professionals for the country. He expressed concern over practice of handing over additional charge to individuals in higher education and expressed his resolve that the practice would end soon. The minister also claimed that standard of public sector universities in Punjab would be improved according to the international standards so that universities could be included in the ranking of top 500 universities of the world.

Talking about recent clash between Islami Jamiat Talaba (IJT) activists and security guards at Punjab University, he said FIR had been registered against eight activists and added the police had been directed to take strict action against those involved. 

Earlier, chairing the meeting he gave 14-point agenda to the VCs to sufficiently improve the overall standards of their universities and directed them to develop and implement a composite roadmap of future vision so that the target of bringing sufficient improvements in the higher education sector could be achieved according to timeline.

The meeting reviewed various features of public sector universities, including the state of academics, future vision, financial and administrative position and available research facilities, being imparted to the students.

The VCs gave a detailed briefing about their universities’ working. While addressing the meeting, the minister said that the Punjab government is fully committed to bringing qualitative improvements in public sector universities so that they could get conspicuous place in top 500 universities of the world and Punjab be known as the hub of quality education in the whole of Asia.