GILGIT, April 9: The Karakoram International University (KIU) has decided to shut down its programme with 750 students due to non-availability of required funds, informed sources said on Friday.

It will resume classes only when the Northern Areas Education Department provides funds for the classes, a KIU official said. The closure is being done in the middle of the academic programme.

In October 2003, the KIU decided to continue HSSC classes at the campus in Gilgit parallel to two newly-established degree colleges in Gilgit which were set up in lieu of the now defunct postgraduate college at Gilgit, the sources said. They said KIU collected a huge amount as tuition fee from the students but now it has refused to run the higher secondary classes.

The former vice chancellor of KIU in consultation with the Northern Areas chief secretary, Northern Areas Legislative Council members and other high ups decided to run the KIU college on a permanent basis and parents were also assured that all the three colleges would serve as feeding units of KIU. But now with the change of VC of KIU, its news administration has refused to honour its pledge, the affected students said.

They said this would create academic problems for the students, they said. The KIU has also sacked at least 17 lecturers of its under-graduate programme. The affected teachers said the KIU sacked them on the pretext that it could not spend the university funds for running of the higher secondary classes.

The Northern Areas education advisor Hafiz Hafizur Rahman informed the Northern Areas Legislative Council on Friday that he would submit a detailed report on Tuesday in the current session regarding this issue.

EDUCATION POLICY: The overall education policy of the Northern Areas Education Department came under fire on Friday in the third day of Northern Areas Legislative Council's 21st Session as large number of legislators expressed their dissatisfaction and dismay over the way the educational matters were being run in the region.

Education Advisor for the Northern Areas Hafiz Hafizur Rahman informed the House that there were numerous socio-cultural and geographical hurdles regarding the postings and transfers particularly in the case of women, and this flawed system could not be reformed overnight.

The advisor informed the House that Rs50m were being spent on education for all programme and priorities of the legislators for construction of school buildings would be accommodated.

The Advisor further informed the House that he would cancel already conducted tests and interviews if specific evidence of the malpractice cases were provided to him and not on generalized accusations.

Speaking at a point of order, NALC members Rehmat Khaliq, Agha Muhammad Ali Shah Rizvi and Ghulam Ali Haideri said that the involvement of the Army Monitoring Teams in recruitment and transfer cases had increased corruption and malpractice's in the region.

The NALC Speaker Haji Sahib Khan in his ruling maintained that the House should be briefed in detail during the current session and tests and interviews for recruitment of teachers be re-arranged wherever the cases of corruption and malpractice had been reported.

The House also passed three resolutions unanimously regarding the separation of CSS quota of Northern Areas from federally administered tribal (FATA) areas, enhancement of student scholarship at double rate and restoration of areas office and branch offices of Small and Medium Enterprises (SME) in the region which were abolished recently.