LAHORE, Dec 10: The Federation of All Pakistan Universities Academic Staff Association (FAPUASA) has urged the Punjab government to give representation to elected faculty representatives on decision-making committees at the provincial level as well as in syndicates of newly-established universities.

At a press conference on Monday, association president Dr Kalimullah Bareach said the provincial government had amended universities’ acts without consulting the elected representatives of faculty members – the real stakeholders.

He urged the chief minister to include elected faculty members in the newly-constituted committee headed by Senator Ishaq Dar for the review of amendments to universities’ acts.

He suggested that the Punjab government should develop a uniform act for all universities in line with the precedent of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

According to the FAPUASA president, all provincial governments should appoint vice chancellors (in public universities) who should be professors in the university with 15 years of service. He said ex-army men, bureaucrats and other technocrats should be removed from vice chancellorships of the public sector universities.

“No vice chancellor should be appointed from outside the varsity faculty,” he suggested.

The FAPUASA president said the criteria for the selection of the VC should not be vague but clearly stated. He said a provision for the VCs search committee should be included in the charters and the members of the search committee should be non-political and all members should have distinguished academic careers.

Referring to budget cuts in universities, Dr Bareach said the universities were facing a severe shortage of funds. He said both the federal and Punjab governments should provide proper funding instead of diverting higher education funds to other projects. He also demanded that the retirement age of professor should be increased to 65 years.

Dr Bareach demanded that all universities’ syndicates should have representation of elected faculty members.

Citing an example of Balochistan, the FAPUASA president said the universities’ syndicates had at least 50 per cent representation of elected faculty members.

The FAPUASA president demanded that the government should include elected faculty members in the chief minister’s committee re-visiting the universities’ acts within 10 days otherwise federation’s central general body meeting would be called in Lahore.