ISLAMABAD, May 16: The Higher Education Commission (HEC) on Thursday cancelled the degree-awarding status of eight universities after they failed to meet the set standards.

Out of the eight universities, three were established during the last few months of the previous parliament.

According to the HEC, the eight institutions are: My University (Islamabad), Darul Madina International University (Islamabad), South Asian Strategic Institute University (Islamabad), Capital University (Islamabad), the Pakistan Institute of Management (Karachi), Habib University Foundation (Karachi), Nazeer Hussain University (Karachi) and Lal Shahbaz University (Karachi).

“The HEC recognises degrees of 146 universities/institutions in the public and private sector. A complete list of the approved universities/institutes is available on the HEC website,” said an official of the commission.

“It has been decided that HEC will not recognise degrees issued by the universities/institutes which are operating without having the NOC from the HEC,” he said.

It may be mentioned that the bills for the establishment of three federal universities - My University, Darul Madina International University and the South Asian Strategic Stability Institute University - were tabled in the National Assembly by former MNA Yasmeen Rehman of the PPP on January 29, 2013.

According to the normal procedure, such bills are referred to the standing committees which after getting input from all departments and stakeholders approve it and then sent it back to parliament for further debate.

But in this case, the bills were directly tabled in the National Assembly and approved within minutes.

According to the sub-clause 10, chapter II of the 2002 ordinance through which the HEC was established, it is the responsibility of the HEC to prescribe conditions under which institutions, including those that are not part of the state education system, may be opened and operated.

Besides, clause ‘f’ of the same chapter says that it will be the function of the HEC to advise the federal and the provincial governments on proposals for granting a charter to a degree-awarding institution in both public and private sector.

An officer of the HEC on the condition of anonymity said according to rules of procedure it was the responsibility of the HEC to ensure that persons who wanted to establish universities met all the requirements.

“We have to see if people who want to establish a university have proper land, funds to provide facilities and what kind of faculty members they are looking to hire. After that, we suggest that a charter should be given to them. But in this case, standards were not met so we had no choice but to cancel the degree-awarding status of the universities,” he said.

He said these institutions were advised to approach the HEC for grant of NOC before initiating any academic activity, including admission, in any degree programme.

The HEC will not recognise any degree/certificate issued by these eight institutions, he added.

When contacted, HEC Executive Director Dr Mukhtar Ahmed said he had just come from abroad but as far as he knew some of the universities had failed to get NOC from the HEC due to which it was a normal procedure to cancel their degree-awarding status.