A parliamentary panel on Tuesday was informed that there was not a single degree college in district Torghar of Khyber Pakhtunkhawa (KPK). Professor Dr Habib Ahmad, acting Vice Chancellor (VC) Hazara University (HU), revealed this while briefing the sub-committee on Senate Standing Committee on Federal Education and Professional Training which held under the convenership of Senator Sehar Kamran. He said that HU was serving the students of six districts of Hazara division including Haripur, Abbotabad, Mansehara, Kohsitan, Torghar and Battgram. Before the establishment of HU the students of the division were forced to travel Punjab and other parts of the country for higher education, he added. The VC said that as a result thousands of poor students, who wanted to complete higher education, remained unable to fulfil their dreams but with the establishment of HU now over 70 percent students enrolled in the institution were hailing from three most backward districts of the division. Briefing the panel, Chairman Higher Education Commission0(HEC), Dr Mukhtar Ahmed said that recently Prime Minister of Pakistan had allocated Rs 1 billion for the development of the university which serves a few most backward districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhawa.
The committee members express serious concern over the revelations and urged the concern authorities to establish degree colleges in the area so that students of the area can get access to their basic right of education. Chairman HEC also informed the committee that the university under faculty development programme of the HEC sent 30 students abroad for PhD degree and all of them successfully completed the doctorate degrees. He added due to local politics these highly qualified faculty members were not promoted in the past five years and finally HEC asked the HU to release all these lecturers so that their expertise could be utilised in the best manners for national development. On getting HEC notice the authorities of HU finally promoted those teachers and now the university is working to introduce geology department as annually hundreds of local students seek admission in other universities in geological department. The meeting was attended by Senator Mushahid Hussain Syed and Senator Mohammad Javid Abbasi, besides officials of HU and HEC.
Same version of the article appeared in Business Recorder