LAHORE, Oct 22: In view of the lukewarm response from the Punjab government, the World Punjabi Congress has now decided to establish a Punjabi university in Lahore by March next year on its own.

The organization had announced establishment of the university at the Waris Shah International Conference, which was held in July this year and attended by delegates from 20 countries.

According to the declaration of the conference, the university was to become functional by March next year with the assistance of the provincial government.

“The congress wanted the government to give it land and share funds for the university. But since the response has been lukewarm, we have decided to go ahead on our own and sought help of the private sector that has been promised,” said WPC chairman Fakhar Zaman while talking to Dawn on Saturday.

The institution, he said, would be established in a rented building and function like other universities in the private sector. The fees would be reasonable as the objective of the congress was to promote Punjabi and not make profits.

It would offer postgraduate diploma courses in Punjabi, Urdu, English and other national (regional) languages in Pakistan. It would also offer masters courses in Punjabi, having Gurmukhi script and Indian Punjabi language literature as compulsory subjects.

“At present, Indian Punjabi literature is not being taught in the Punjab University and elsewhere in the country and no-one knows about Amrita Pritam.”

Whereas, Mr Zaman said, the Patiala Punjabi University, the Chandigarh Punjabi University, the Amritsar Punjabi University and the Delhi University’s Department of Punjabi were teaching Pakistani Punjabi literature as a compulsory subject.

In addition, he said, the university would introduce social sciences disciplines like history, philosophy, sociology, political science, economics and mass communication. They could be taught in English or Urdu and the university would also introduce science subjects afterwards.

He said the congress had been offered voluntary teaching by renowned scholars and teachers. Scholars from Indian universities would be engaged as visiting faculty, he said. He said the Punjabi congress still wanted the government to contribute in the shape of land or funds, hoping these would soon be given to it.