The Punjab Higher Education Department (HED) is apparently accepting its failure in running the department effectively – to give leverage to the chief minister’s pre-vice chancellors’ meeting decision to set up the Punjab Higher Education Commission (HEC).

Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif had on March 22 announced the setting up of Punjab HEC and constituted a five-member vice chancellors committee to “draft a question leading to the answer that Punjab HEC is highly necessary to improve higher education standards and funding in the province”.

At the three-day (March 26-28) vice chancellors conference called by the VCs committee at Government College University Lahore, the vice chancellors were initially reluctant to give a go-ahead for setting up of an independent HEC and even had reservations about getting funds from the Punjab government, which had long stopped giving grants to universities.

After finding out about legal issues in the setting up of an HEC in the province in the wake of embarrassment being faced by the Sindh government, the VCs seemed to be developing a consensus that the provincial government should first look into legal issues because the federal HEC had not devolved powers to provinces under the 18th Amendment on the basis of a Supreme Court judgement.

However, the VCs later started looking at the constitution of a provincial HEC whose functions did not clash with the federal body but would maximise efficacy of governance, implementation of policies, monitoring and evaluation, provincial level funding and facilitating improvement in higher education standards.

In order to stress the importance of a provincial commission, the Punjab HED said its scope had expanded manifold and it could not manage all universities and colleges effectively.Newly posted Punjab Higher Education Secretary Abdullah Sumbal said the ever-growing higher education sector, including private, was becoming unmanageable and there was a need to take innovative measures to govern effectively.

Sumbal, who recently gave a presentation to the chief minister on the proposed commission, said it would not work in conflict with the federal HEC; instead both autonomous bodies would work to improve higher education in the province. He said the nomenclature of the provincial body cold be formulated so it did not damage HEC’s credibility at an international level.

He admitted there was a dire need for reforms in higher education in Punjab due to multiple factors, including growing requirements for faculty development, low gross enrolment ratio compared to international standards, poor quality of higher education particularly in colleges and relevance of higher education for socio-economic development of the country.

He said the proposed commission would also make collaborations for revision of curriculum and the evaluation system to develop creativity, analytical ability, critical thinking, supporting quality enhancement regime, focusing on research and collaborations with national and international higher education institutions. He also said the commission would coordinate and facilitate academic, administrative and financial matters of all higher education institutions, including general and professional universities and degree-awarding institutions in Punjab, as per similar structure of the federal HEC.

Answering a question whether the Punjab HED should be disbanded as all of its functions will be adopted by the proposed HEC, Sumbal said the department would focus on development work and bring in innovations. He said it would focus on establishing a ‘Knowledge Park’ as well as other development schemes besides modernising human resource management in the province.

He said the department would also organise third-party validation of different institutions performance, including service delivery, and take corrective measures. He admitted that many autonomous institutions had misused powers. He said the proposed commission would be able to regulate universities and colleges properly as its role would be consultative as well as corrective.

Academicians foresaw the government also requiring establishment of public limited companies in education sector departments, including schools, literacy, special education and technical education, as the bureaucracy had failed to earn any feather in their caps since the consolidated education department was split into five departments over a decade ago.

Meanwhile, it was learnt that 65 heads of public higher education institutions from across Pakistan attended the vice chancellors committee meeting in Islamabad and resolved that provincial higher education bodies should not be established without proper consultation and discussion. They also asserted that provincial bodies’ functions should not contradict those of the federal HEC.

A Punjab University spokesman said over 154,000 books had been purchased at the varsity’s three-day fair. It showed that such fairs could help promote the book culture and reading habits among people, particularly the youth.

Punjab Education Minister Rana Mashood Ahmed Khan and Government College University (GCU) Vice Chancellor Prof Dr Khaleequr Rahman announced cash prizes for the cast and team of GCU Dramatics Club for staging Bano Qudsia’s play Mukhtarnama.

The VC announced Rs300,000 for the entire team involved in staging the play as part of the university’s 150-year celebrations.

The minister stressed that universities must encourage co-curricular activities as they played a crucial role in highlighting a positive image of Pakistan. The minister asserted that the GCU’s highly trained and professional performers could compete with any best drama team of the world.

Prof Rahman said theatre had an important part to play in reforming society and asserted it was imperative that university theatre groups pick up themes that educated as well as entertained. — mansoormalik173@hotmail.com