CM asked to get Centre to restore, raise universities’ grant

The Sindh Higher Education Commission (HEC) chairman has request the chief minister to inform the prime minister and the federal finance minister about the ending of the grant to the provinces’ universities, and to request them to not only restore but to increase the public universities’ budget to Rs16 billion.

Dr Tariq Rafi’s letter to the CM states that the Federal HEC has been providing Rs13 billion to Sindh’s public universities, and that the federal government has decided to stop funding all the provincial universities and to only fund federal universities, while their budget has been slashed from Rs65 billion to Rs25 billion.

Dr Rafi said that this unilateral decision would have quite an adverse effect on Sindh’s universities, placing almost all of them in deficit budgeting of billions of rupees and forcing them to either increase students’ fees or cut down their transport, hostel and many other facilities being provided to them.

He said the vice chancellors of Sindh’s universities had held a meeting on the issue and have written to the CM and the PM about it. He acknowledged that the CM is aware of the significance of higher education in the development of any country and its human resource. He lamented that this unilateral decision is against the decision of the Council of Common Interests.

He pointed out that the provincial government has been providing a recurring grant through the Sindh HEC, amounting to Rs22 billion this financial year and expected to be increased to Rs30 billion in the next.

Dr Rafi said the Sindh HEC has always remained committed under the CM’s guidance to improve the standard of education in the province. He said the CM’s continuous and unwavering support has made all of this possible.