With education being on the backburner for the majority of Pakistan’s existence, the Pakistan Peoples Party-led government has decided to give it more importance in the upcoming budget. It has allocated Rs15.8 billion for the development of higher education in the proposed Public Service Development Programme for fiscal 2012-2013, against Rs14 billion allocated last year.
Amid criticism over the low percentage of providing scholarships for Pakistanis to study abroad, a handsome amount has been allocated for scholarships for Master of Philosophy (MPhil) and Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) students to study outside Pakistan.
The Planning Commission proposed Rs1.4 billion for the Overseas Scholarship Scheme (OSS) for Master of Science (MS) and MPhil students to pursue PhD degrees in selected fields (Phase II), while the estimated cost was Rs14.5 billion. Another Rs625 million has been earmarked for the PhD fellowship programme for 5,000 scholarship-based students. The total estimated cost of the project was Rs6.3 billion, while the review stated that Rs3.9 billion was spent till June 2012.
The OSS will also be granted Rs155 million for students wanting to study abroad, while Rs28.7 million for MS and MPhil students to pursue PhDs in Engineering, Natural and Basic Sciences, Humanities and Social Sciences at local universities will be allocated.
However, for the Fulbright Scholarship Programme, co-funded by the Higher Education Commission (HEC) and United States Agency for International Development, only Rs5 million was generated, while the total estimated cost of HEC’s share in the project was Rs2.72 billion for the last fiscal. For Phase II of the Post Doctoral Fellowship Programme, Rs200 million was spared.
For 2012-13, the planning commission has proposed Rs70 million for 1,000 Cuban Scholarships for Studies in General Comprehensive Medicine. The total estimated cost of the project was Rs978 million, whereas Rs659 million have been spent up to June 2012.
The commission also proposed Rs9 million in financial support for merit-based and poor students to study at top public and private institutions at the under-graduate and graduate level. Rs113 million was spent up to June 2012, against a total allocation of Rs122.4 million.
Infrastructure development
A major chunk of the proposed allocations, however, goes to infrastructure development, including the establishment of new educational institutions and a department for higher education, besides upgrading and improving the existing facilities.
For the establishment of universities in Turbat and Loralai in Balochistan, Rs180 million each was proposed. Another Rs110 million will be allocated to develop the University of Balochistan, Quetta.
Rs100 million was also earmarked to establish Gilani Law College at Bahauddin Zakariya University (BZU), Multan.
A university for women in Multan will be established at the cost of Rs1.16 billion. The Planning Commission has proposed Rs30 million for the construction of an academic block at Air University, Islamabad.
Similarly, for the development of Fatima Jinnah Women University Rawalpindi Campus II, the commission has pledged Rs100 million. Rs93 million will be earmarked to build the Frontier Women University Peshawar.
Another Rs100 million has been included for the creation of the National College of Arts campus in Rawalpindi. But, only Rs164 million has been spent on the project till June 2012 of the estimated total cost of Rs453 million.
For the ongoing schemes of making a medical college at the University of Sargodha and an education faculty at the University of Okara, Rs100 million each has been proposed.
During its Annual Plan 2011-12, the Planning Commission stressed on the need for infrastructure development and research, to improve the higher education standards in the country up to international standards. Therefore, the bulk of the spending has been directed towards the development of these two areas.
Published in The Express Tribune, June 2nd, 2012.
Correction: An earlier version of this article had misspelt "Fulbright". The error is regretted.
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