VCs oppose cuts in education budget

LAHORE: Vice Chancellors (VCs) of all public sector universities have expressed their strong criticism of the recent cuts imposed by the Finance Ministry on the budget for higher education.

A resolution passed by the university heads, after the Vice Chancellors Committee meeting held online on Tuesday, stated that Pakistani universities are already under enormous financial stress because of the squeezing of their budgets since last three years. Currently, the Covid-19 crisis has further exacerbated the situation, both by increasing costs, and by reducing the inflows of tuition fees.

According to a press release, the Vice Chancellors appealed to the Prime Minister, the Education Minister, and the SAPM for Finance to immediately reverse the cuts, and enhance the higher education budget to the levels needed by universities.

The resolution emphasised that future of the country depends critically on the future of education, especially higher education. If the funding cuts are not reversed, some universities will not be able to survive. It will force some universities to raise tuition fees at a time when students are unable or unwilling to pay regular tuition because of the virus pandemic.

The VCs asked Chairman HEC to arrange a meeting of a delegation of Vice Chancellors (VCs) to call upon the honorable Prime Minister to apprise him of the difficulties faced by universities because of the repeated budget cuts over the last three years.

The Vice Chancellors also expressed their unequivocal opposition to the actions of some elements to change legal provisions and undermine the autonomy of universities, especially draft changes in the Public Sector Universities (Amendment) Act 2020.

Act opposed: Federation of All Pakistan Universities Academic Staff Association (FAPUASA) has strongly condemned and opposed, what it termed, the attempts to impose a politically influenced “Public Sector Universities (Amendment) Act 2020”. In this regard, an online meeting of FAPUASA held here Tuesday which was presided over by FAPUASA Central President Dr Sohail Yousaf, President.

FAPUASA Punjab President Prof Dr Mumtaz Anwar Chaudhry and representatives from provincial chapters and academic staff associations from various universities of the Pakistan attended the meeting.

Major issues affecting universities in general and faculty/staff in particular were discussed at length. In a press statement, Dr Sohail Yousaf, Dr Mumtaz Anwar and others said any such attempt to reduce or compromise the autonomy of universities would be met with resistance by faculty. They said FAPUASA did not accept the proposal to appoint retired judges or bureaucrats as head of Syndicate. They urged the vice-chancellors (VCs) to take a strong stance to preserve the autonomy of the universities of the Punjab.