ISLAMABAD: The Higher Education Commission (HEC) has directed Preston University’s Islamabad campus to withdraw all PhD admissions given since the Fall-2014 session.

The HEC took the decision following a visit of its review committee to the campus on March 14. The team reported that the university was running the PhD programmes without fulfilling HEC criteria.

A source in HEC told Dawn on Tuesday that Preston University had been stopped from offering new admissions in its PhD programmes. The commission also directed the university to withdraw all admissions in PhD Management Sciences programme that it offered from Fall-2014.

The source said the PhD programme review committee had visited the Islamabad campus of the university in April 2014 and halted its PhD programmes for not fulfilling the criteria.

The source said the review committee had directed the varsity to stop further intake in all the PhD programmes until the HEC allows it to do so.

“During the first visit, our review committee noted that there were over 700 students enrolled in the MS and MPhil programmes but the university had insufficient staff and a highly inappropriate student-teacher ratio,” the source said.

HEC also directs the varsity to withdraw all PhD admissions granted since 2014 for not meeting criteria

It was also noted that the main campus of the university in Kohat was not offering any PhD programme. However, the source said the university did not comply with the directions of HEC and continued admissions.

Last week, the review committee again visited the campus in order to assess the compliance of the directions. The committee found that the university was continuously violating directives and not following the minimum criteria.

The source said the review committee noticed that the varsity had enrolled a large number of scholars in PhD Management Sciences programmes despite an embargo on the new admissions.

When contacted, the public relations officer of Preston University, Abrar Sial, expressed ignorance about the matter. “I’m not aware of any bar imposed by the HEC on our university. I’ll let you know on Thursday,” he said.

However, HEC’s spokesperson Ayesha Ikram confirmed to Dawn that Preston University had been directed to withdraw the PhD admissions awarded from Fall- 2014.

“We took this decision because despite repeated efforts, the university was not taking any step to improve its standards,” she said, adding the university had been directed not to award further admissions in the PhD programme.

Meanwhile, the HEC also decided not to attest degrees of MS/MPhil and equivalent programmes of Lahore Leads University until the university follows the HEC criteria. “The university has not stopped its MS/MPhil and equivalent programmes despite an instruction from the HEC. Therefore, it has been decided that the HEC will not attest the degrees of MS/MPhil and equivalent programmes awarded by Lahore Leads University, Lahore, until the university complies with the HEC guideline,” a document of the HEC stated.

The HEC spokesperson added: “Until the Lahore Leads University complies with the HEC directive, its MS/Mphil degrees will not be attested.”

Published in Dawn, March 23rd, 2016