100 colleges unable to offer admissions

Around 100 government commerce colleges in Punjab are unable to begin the admission process this year because of the shortage of teachers.

The situation will leave thousands of students from poor families in various districts at the mercy of private colleges. According to teachers, the affected colleges are also facing lack of infrastructure, including buildings and computer labs.

They said the Punjab government had planned to merge the commerce colleges into the nearest government degree colleges to solve the issue, but the college teachers' unions had not accepted the plan. Sources in the Punjab Higher Education Department said it had decided to close down around 45 commerce colleges in the initial stage.

A notification had been issued last week to merge those colleges into the bigger institutions.

However, teachers of the government colleges across Punjab protested against the decision, after which it was cancelled. However, it was later decided that around 100 colleges would be advised not to offer admissions to the first year in the new session.

No recruitment has been done in the government commerce colleges during the past 12 years. In this period, hundreds of teaches have retired without replacement.

The sources said there were a number of colleges that had only one or two teachers for commerce education.

The college education authorities had also faced criticism last year when thousands of students had been deprived of admissions because of a low number of seats offered. A student, Awais Shahab, said the youth like him who had been waiting for the admissions were now left with the options of quitting education or studying in private colleges that charged high fees.

A former president of the Punjab Professors and College Lecturers Association, Tariq Kaleem, said recruitment was the best solution.