LAHORE: Higher Education Commission (HEC) Chairman Dr Mukhtar Ahmed said on Tuesday that the government has reversed the decision to cut the commission’s recurring budget from Rs65 billion to Rs25 billion and development budget from Rs55bn to Rs 21bn.

In a video statement, the HEC chairman welcomed the federal government’s decision to restore recurring and development budgets of the higher education sector for FY 2024-25.

Two weeks ago, the federal government had issued a notification to reduce the budget of the HEC for the financial year 2024-25 from Rs65bn to Rs25bn and it has been limited to only federal area universities though earlier it used to include provincial universities in its budget.

Giving background of the reversal of the decision, Dr Ahmed says that the academic circles and teachers had shown concerns over the budget cut and the commission also had written letters to the federal and provincial governments to increase the budget. He says Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has taken notice of the budget cut as it will affect millions of students who will have to face financial problems in continuing their higher education.

FAPUASA seeks further increase

He says the commission has been conveyed the message that the government has restored the recurring budget of Rs65bn and development budget of Rs55bn. He also demanded all the provincial governments to increase the higher education budget.

He praised and thanked the Sindh government for raising the higher education budget from Rs20bn to Rs30bn and appealed to other governments to follow example set by the Sindh government.

The Federation of All Pakistan Universities Academic Staff Association (FAPUASA) also welcomed the restoration of the HEC budget to Rs 65bn.

However, FAPUASA contends that this increase is insufficient to address the severe financial crisis faced by the universities.

FAPUASA calls for a substantial grant of Rs500bn to rescue Pakistani universities from dire economic conditions. The HEC had initially sought Rs125bn from the federal government. Unfortunately, the government reduced this amount to Rs25bn before finally restoring it to the current level of Rs65bn, a grant that had been frozen since 2018.

Given the precarious financial state of universities, FAPUASA vows to persist in its struggle until the recurring grant is significantly augmented. Additionally, FAPUASA demands that provincial governments allocate more funds to higher education.

The association announced to hold a peaceful demonstration in front of press clubs across major cities in the country on Wednesday (today).

Meanwhile, Punjab Higher Education Commission (PHEC) Chairperson Dr Shahid Munir has written a letter to the Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz, seeking increase in the funding for the universities in the province for the fiscal year 2024-25.

The letter available with Dawn states that the federal government has issued provisional Indicative Budget Ceilings (IBC) in favour of the Higher Education Commission (HEC), Islamabad. However, the allocation of Rs25 billion is only for the Federally Chartered Universities, Higher Education Institutions (HEIs), Centres, and Research Programs.

Dr Munir pointed out that in previous years, the federal government allocated recurring budgets for the provincial chartered universities of Punjab through HEC. However, for FY 2024-25, the federal government has only allocated recurring budgets to Federal Chartered Universities. This has put the future of over 500,000 students studying in 50 public sector universities in Punjab at stake.

According to the PHEC Act 2014, the commission is mandated to submit the requirements and release of funds to the universities.

During the demand review committee meetings held in March-April 2024, PHEC noted that the federal government had allocated Rs20.015bn during FY 2023-24 as a recurring budget to the universities in Punjab through HEC Islamabad, which is around 40 percent of their total budget. The Punjab government had allocated only Rs5.235bn to the universities as a recurring budget during FY 2023-24.

The major expenditures of the universities are the salary components of the teaching and non-teaching staff members, whereas the major income for the universities is tuition fee charged from the students.

The government had established new public sector universities and sub-campuses in the province and the financial requirements of the existing and new universities have increased.

Dr Munir urged the chief minister to allocate the required funds to meet the recurring expenditures of the universities for their smooth operations.

He emphasised that this allocation would be directly linked with the future of the students.

He also cited Sindh government’s example which has increased the budget for the province’s universities by Rs10bn, urging Punjab to follow it and increase the budget of its higher education commission to safeguard the future of hundreds of thousands of students.

Published in Dawn, June 5th, 2024