Govt committed to promoting quality research in varsities: KP CM Mahmood Khan

PESHAWAR: Chief Minister Mahmood Khan has directed the Higher Education Department to immediately prepare rules and regulations under the Higher Education Research Endowment Fund (HEREF) Act and present it in the next meeting of the board of directors.

He was chairing the 5th meeting of board of directors of HEREF at the Chief Minister’s House here, said a handout.

Special assistant to Chief Minister for Information and Higher Education Kamran Bangash, Advisor to chief minister for Science and Information Technology Ziaullah Bangash, administrative secretaries of departments concerned, vice-chancellors of different universities and other senior officials attended the meeting.

The meeting confirmed the minutes of the previous meeting and reviewed the implementation status of decisions taken in the last BoD meeting. The chief minister directed that all the requirements should be met in time so that the objectives of the endowment fund could be achieved.

Mahmood Khan said that the purpose behind setting up an endowment fund was to promote quality research in universities by financing research proposals. He directed the relevant authorities to meet all requirements including formulation of rules and regulations without any delay.

The meeting formally approved a four-member investment committee headed by secretary higher education department, which would ensure timely investment of seed money under HEREF.

The meeting was informed that the Higher Education Research Endowment Fund Act was enacted in 2014 initially with a seed money of Rs50 million, which was later increased to Rs500 million.