HEC’s policies revolve around quantity, not quality: Hamdard University VC

The Hamdard University’s vice chancellor has criticised the Higher Education Commission for its “policies which revolve around quantity, not quality”. Prof Dr Syed Shabib ul Hasan said the number of publications produced by a teacher “is no measure of their ability to produce good graduates”.

The VC remarked that it was not necessary that a good researcher was also a good teacher and vice versa. He said the Hamdard University encouraged its students to adopt a practical approach in their research work so that they could contribute in social development according to the vision of Hakim Muhammad Said, the founder of Hamdard University and a renowned researcher in eastern medicine.

He expressed these views during a meeting with journalists as he briefed them on the annual progress of the Hamdard University. Prof Hasan said the Hamdard University was seeking collaborations with several varsities and companies to link academia and industries so that the students could get industrial exposure along with their studies. In this regards, he said, the university in the past had organised a job fair, in which around 60 companies participated.

Likewise, an exhibition of the projects developed by the students was held under the management of the Hamdard University at the Expo Centere Karachi, he added. The exhibition was aimed at encouraging students who take an interest in practical solutions to the problems, he said, adding that the students of other varsities also attended the exhibition.

“The management of the Hamdard University believes in services for the society as instructed by Hakim Muhammad Said,” he added. The vice chancellor said due to a raise in the budget allocated for research activities, the impact factor of the researches explored by the Hamdard University scholars was three times more than the last year. He said the varsity had been adding programmes according to modern trends and needs. Recently, he said, five disciplines were added by them.

Talking about the Hamdard Scholarship Programme, he said the varsity had allocated Rs65 millions in its annual budget to award scholarships to deserving students.

When asked if the varsity, which is situated near the border of Balochistan, was providing any incentive to Baloch students as Balochistan was behind in education, he first argued that this impression was not right that Balochistan was lagging in education. He said a recent photo of a long queue at a library in Turbat spoke volumes about how Baloch students were trying to excel.

He added that the varsity had also been focussing on nearby villages and one graduate from a village located near the varsity would soon join the faculty.

“In Pakistan, universities generally boast of their achievements in numerical terms such as how many graduates they have produced or how many departments they have opened or how many research papers their teachers have authored. However, there is little focus on whether the varsities are successful in creating a sense of understanding in students about their fields and if they are producing such graduates who can add value to society,” he added.

Replying to a question, he said sometimes it “becomes difficult particularly for the private universities in the term following policies issued by the Sindh Higher Education Commission and the Higher Education Commission of Pakistan. Therefore, policies of both the commissions must be uniform”.

When asked if the slash in the HEC funds had affected the Hamdard University, he said “being a private varsity, they were not affected as the HEC did not provide them funds”.