“Universities are already facing a crunch for local faculty accommodation so there is no harm if these faculty members reside in our hostels,” says HEC Chairperson. PHOTO: FILE
The Higher Education Commission’s (HEC) Rs1 billion Foreign Faculty Hostels project has failed to serve its purpose of accommodating prominent foreign faculty members, resulting in major losses to the exchequer.
The HEC’s Foreign Faculty Hiring Programme was initiated to help lure renowned faculty members to Pakistani universities in a bid to help mitigate the brain drain which currently grips the country. According to sources, suites in 27 hostels have been occupied by unauthorised persons in some instances. A total of 31 hostels were to be constructed across the country. All suites have central air-conditioning and comprise of a lounge, bedroom, store room, washroom and terrace.
At Quaid-i-Azam University, 10 of the 12 suites are being used by local faculty members, while hostels at a university in Sindh have been occupied by a deputy superintendent of police and the family of the varsity’s vice chancellor, said sources.
An HEC official, requesting anonymity, said the commission should stop wasting money on such projects if services were going to be misused. A hostel built for 15 to 20 foreign faculty members for Rs15.93 million at the University of Arid Agriculture in Rawalpindi has yet to serve its purpose. Likewise, the 15 suites constructed at Sindh University’s Jamshoro campus have only been used by local professors.
“The main reason for this is the deteriorating law and order situation in the country. Foreigners are reluctant to come and teach here in the current circumstances,” said Foreign Faculty Hiring Programme Director Waseem Hashmi. He cited the example of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, where all of the hostels were being misused. Only a limited number of varsities were accommodating foreign professors, Punjab University being one of them, he added.
HEC Chairperson Javaid Laghari denied any knowledge of the hostels’ misuse. “Universities are already facing a crunch for local faculty accommodation so there is no harm if these faculty members reside in our hostels,” he said. Laghari confirmed that while the project had initially hired over 300 professors, the number had been truncated to 80 across the country as many had completed their contracts. He added that the HEC would be sending a PC-1 to the Finance Division for approval of new recruits for other projects.
Published in The Express Tribune, May 14th, 2013.
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I have never read or heard anything positive that HEC may have done. They constantly stumble from one scandal to another. It is high time that someone does a forensic audit of this organization.