Former HEC chairperson Dr Attaur Rehman. PHOTO: FILE
When the Sindh Assembly passed a bill to devolve the Higher Education Commission (HEC), it committed contempt of the Supreme Court, said former HEC chairperson Dr Attaur Rahman.
Talking to The Express Tribune at the ground-breaking ceremony of a nanotechnology research institute at University of Karachi on Monday, Dr Rahman demanded the move be annulled.
He said that the HEC was an independent body that did not work under any ministry so its devolution as imagined under the 18th Amendment was not possible. “For uniformity of standards and quality assurance, higher education remains a federal subject in most parts of the world.”
Even after the 18th Amendment, Attorney General Maulvi Anwarul Haq clarified before the three-member bench headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry that “the status of HEC, as it has been assigned to it under Higher Education Commission Ordinance 2002, shall remain intact unless it is changed by promulgation of some legislation in this behalf.”
Contrary to the misinformation forwarded by certain quarters, Dr Atta said, a very small fiscal budget was spent in the higher education sector. “By spending only 1.8 per cent of GDP on education, Pakistan already stays at the bottom seventh position in the world,” he said. “Only 10 to 11 per cent of the education budget is spent on higher education as compared to the international norm of 25 per cent.”
Published in The Express Tribune, February 26th, 2013.
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