ISLAMABAD: The issue of controversial legislation passed by the Sindh Assembly for appointing bureaucrats as vice chancellors echoed in the National Assembly on Tuesday when a Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) lawmaker tore copy of the bill and termed it against the Constitution.

Speaking on a point of order, MQM-P’s Khawaja Izhar-ul-Hassan said that the Sindh government’s controversial bill for appointing bureaucrats as VCs in universities in the province was a targeted move against the Higher Education Commission (HEC) of Pakistan.

Terming the legislation “an insult to academia and breach of privilege of Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif”, he said that teachers had been protesting against the new law.

He also tore a copy of the legislation in the house in protest.

Earlier, MNA Aliya Kamran of the Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) said that the public sector universities in the country had been facing shortage of funding.

Speaking on a point of order, she quoted a statement of the HEC chairman and said that only 0.22 per cent of the national budget was being spent on education sector.

The lawmaker said that whenever the issue was raised, the federal government claimed that it was cognizant of the issue.

In response to her point of orders, parliamentary secretary for education Farah Naz Akbar said that in the next budget, more funds would be allocated for higher education sector.

Published in Dawn, February 19th, 2025