A day after the Higher Education Commission (HEC) announced to halt the Tenure Track Statutes (TTS) system in universities over financial constraints, faculty members from various universities have accused the regulatory body chief of jeopardising their job structure and the future of 45,00 teachers.
Addressing a press conference at the National Press Club, the All-Pakistan Tenure Track Association (APTTA), a representative body of TTS faculty from across Pakistan, association leaders Dr Yasar Shah and Dr Tanveer Shehzad said that the HEC chairman has jeopardized the jobs structure and future of 4500 tenure-track faculty members of universities in Pakistan.
Through the revised funding policy shared with all universities, the HEC has said that it will not be able to fund any new TTS programme owing to financial/grant constraints.
“The HEC will not be able to provide funds against TTS owing to serious financial limitations. However, universities may undertake TTS hiring and arrange funds from their own resources,” HEC said told the universities that want to continue with the TTS and recruit faculty under the programme.
The TTS was initiated by HEC with attractive packages for faculty members.
APTTA office-bearers said that the HEC has revised the funding policy of the TTS which will have serious repercussions for the job security, annual increments, and promotion of the TTS faculty because the HEC's share of TTS funding was going to shrink under the revised policy.
They said that universities have already stopped hiring new TTS faculty even though the same faculty has been the best-performing component of university faculty for two decades as per the HEC's recent survey published in 2019.
They said that the TTS system was working very well before the arrival of the current HEC chairman who after taking the charge, has allowed universities to do what they wanted because the HEC is disowning the TTS faculty.
They said that in addition, the prime minister’s approved complete salary was not being given to the TTS faculty. The APTTA leaders gave the HEC a deadline of February 3 to withdraw the new funding policy notification and restore the old funding policy.
They said that if the HEC fails to do so, the APTTA will stage a protest and sit-in in front of the HEC office for an indefinite period.
Published in The Express Tribune, January 28th, 2023.
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