The vice chancellors of public sector universities on Wednesday rejected the proposed HEC Amendment Bill 2013, which mainly suggests clipping HEC chairman’s wings, and showed strong concern and expressed their apprehension that any legislation that takes away the dynamism and autonomy of HEC will damage higher education sector of the country.
A special meeting of executive committee of vice chancellors was held on Wednesday, which was attended by majority of vice chancellors from all over the country. They said that the proposed legislation would severely impact the growth and progress of the higher education sector.
The HEC amendment bill was moved by two MNAs and was discussed in the NA Standing Committee on Education and Training on January 23 that approved the bill to be presented in the parliament for legislation.
The one point agenda of the meeting was the bill and VCs were of the view that the proposed bill, if passed, will take away the autonomy of the HEC. They said that it would also take away the function of the HEC which were aimed at maintaining quality education. It would reduce the terms of the chairman, the board members and the executive director from four years to three, which did not conform to all appointments in the academic community and the universities, like the vice chancellors, members of the senate and syndicate and board of governors which were all of four years.
They were of the unanimous view that HEC was one institution which had functioned extremely well and had delivered during the last decade. The VCs noted that the universities had shown tremendous progress in the last decade and the HEC reforms are being followed by the other countries as role model.
The vice chancellors were of the view that the higher education sector had been a growth engine for socio economic development of Pakistan and it would be extremely unfortunate if at this point legislative steps thwart this achievement by a bill that does not have stakeholders’ consensus.
The vice chancellors felt that after the 18th Amendment, changes in the HEC Act should also have the recommendations of the Task Force proposed by the prime ministers high powered committee. These recommendations should be incorporated in the proposed amendment bill, so that any changes should have broad-based consensus of the stakeholders, which were the universities and the higher education sector and the provincial governments and the chancellors.
It was decided that the executive VC committee would meet the president, prime minister and other law makers to apprise them about the situation.
A meeting of all vice chancellors, both from public and private sector universities would be held on February 6 to have a broad-based discussion and come up with recommendations.
The meeting was attended by HEC Chairman Dr Javaid Laghari, Engr. Syed Imtiaz Hussain Gilani, Acting Executive Director HEC /Vice Chancellor University of Engineering & Technology Peshawar, Dr Nasser Ali Khan, Member HEC/ Vice Chancellor Haripur University, Dr Nasir Jamal Khattak Kohat University of Science & Technology (KUST) Kohat, Balochistan University of Information Technology Engineering and Management Sciences Vice Chancellor Engr Ahmed Farooq Bazai, Sardar Bahadur Khan Women’s University (SBK) VC Sultana Baloch, Punjab University VC Prof Dr Mujahid Kamran, LCWU Dr Sabiha Mansoor, Quaid-i-Azam University VC Prof Dr Masoom Yasinzai, Karakoram International University VC Prof Dr Najma Najam, University of Agriculture VC Prof Dr Iqrar Ahmad Khan, University of Gujrat VC Prof Dr Mohammad Nizamuddin, The Islamia University Bahawalpur VC Dr Muhammad Mukhtar and Abdul Wali Khan University VC Prof Dr Ihsan Ali.
