PESHAWAR: The students of Shuhada-i-Army Public School University of Technology, Nowshera are getting engineering education without conducting any practical experiments as the university is short of required facilities of laboratory, according to sources.

They told Dawn that students were taken occasionally to two private universities in Peshawar and Government Technical College Nowshera for experiments to gain practical knowledge in engineering disciplines.

“The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s first ever technology university was established in 2015 with a vision to produce technologists for the industries to be set up in the province and rest of the country under China-Pakistan Economic Corridor project,” a senior academician of the university told Dawn.

Students have boycotted classes since Tuesday last in protest

Academic activities had been started in the university since November 2016. The first batch of the students is currently in their fifth semester and would be graduated after one-and-a-half year.

Sources said that the university was short of 80 per cent of the required facilities of laboratory. They said that only a few small laboratories were established in different technologies that were not fulfilling the needs of the students.

“Initially we transported the students to the two private universities in Peshawar — Iqra National University Hayatabad and Abaseen University Ring Road — for practical experiments of their courses,” said the faculty member.

However, he said that then it was not possible to take the students to Peshawar for experiments as their number had increased with passing of time. He said that at present more than 400 students were studying at the university.

The faculty member said that 70 per cent of the courses at the university were based on practical experiments while only 30 per cent was theory. He alleged that the university had sufficient funds but couldn’t establish state-of-the-art laboratories owing to inefficiency of the authorities at the helm of affairs.

“Although most of our courses are based on practical experiments, yet we rely on theory owing to lack of laboratories,” said a student of the electrical technology, wishing not to be named as he feared action against him by the university administration.

He alleged that there was no laboratory for the students enrolled in the electrical technology despite the fact they were studying in the fifth semester. In the first two semesters, he said, they didn’t conduct a single experiment. He said that in the second and third semesters, they were taken from Nowshera to Peshawar where they conducted a few experiments in Iqra National University Hayatabad.

He said that students had been boycotting their classes as a protest since Tuesday last against unavailability of laboratories in the university. He said that they also staged protest demonstrations at the university and outside Nowshera Press Club.

Another student enrolled to the department of mechanical technology told Dawn that the university administration failed to establish mechanical laboratories. He said that in the initial semesters, they were taken to Government Technical College Nowshera for experiments as there was no state-of-the-art laboratory in the university.

“The university administration is joking with us by arranging practical experiments in a low level laboratory established for the students of the college. The students of the technology university need high technology laboratories,” said the student.

He said that the students of the mechanical technology had not conducted experiments in different subjects including thermodynamics, machine design, mechanical vibration and strength of material.

A student of the civil technology told Dawn that a few experiments had been conducted in the subject of soil mechanic while no experiment was done so far in other subjects including construction and hydraulic machine, concrete technology and quantity survey.

Dr Khalid Mehmood, the additional registrar of the university, when contacted, declined to comment.

However, a senior official said that efforts were afoot to establish the laboratories. “Tenders for establishment of laboratories at the departments of electrical and mechanical technologies have already been floated in the newspapers,” he said. The official said that setting up of the laboratories would take five to six months.

Published in Dawn, November 12th, 2018