Moalims

ISLAMABAD – Minister for Education and Professional Training Balighur Rehman on Thursday informed the upper house of the that the Higher Education Commission (HEC) has received 13 proposals for setting up of new universities across Pakistan.
Relying to various questions during Question Hour, the minister said that a total of 35 universities had been established during last five years. Giving the breakup, he said that two universities out of total were set up in the capital, 13 in Punjab, nine in Sindh, seven in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, three in Azad Jammu Kashmir and one in Balochistan.
He said that it was envisaged that a university or sub-campus should be set up at every district level. To a supplementary question, he said that the federal government was paying fee of students belonging to Balochistan enrolled in MA/MSc, MPhil and PhD. To another question, he said that Allama Iqbal Open University (AIOU) has never been ranked in HEC rankings and could not be said that the varsity was on the top 20 universities till 2010.
He said that the university had been excluded from the rankings as universities imparting distance learning education were excluded from the ranking due to incompatibility with formal education. He said that the number of students of AIOU had increased. To a question, Baligh told the House that education was a devolved subject after the 18th amendment. However, the national curriculum council was set up to coordinate with each other.
The minister said that as many as 803 employees were working on ad-hoc and daily wages basis in AIOU. The new vice chancellor has made some regular appointment on key administrative posts with the approval of the competent authority. To a question, the minister said that a total of 5536 PhD degrees awarded by the universities during the last five years. Around 25,812 fresh students were enrolled in PhD programme while 180,079 were enrolled in MS and MPhil programmes during the period.
He said that 2265 PhD holders have been provided employment in the universities under the interim placement of fresh PhD. To another question, Baligh told the House that the Punjab University has conducted inquiries against two students for obtaining BA degrees on fake certificates of matric and intermediate.

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