PAKISTAN

Lack of funds places universities on verge of bankruptcy

The chair of Pakistan’s Higher Education Commission (HEC), Dr Javaid Laghari, warned last week that universities are about to go bankrupt due to shortages of funds, reports the Pakistan Observer.

He was delivering a presentation at a meeting of the National Assembly standing committee on professional and technical training. Laghari stated that the HEC has not received funding from the Ministry of Finance for the past four months.

He stated that Peshawar University, two universities in Punjab province, and one university in Sindh province were getting loans from banks, in order to pay the salaries to teachers and other staff. He said the number of universities in Pakistan had grown from 98 to 139 in the past nine years.
Full report on the Pakistan Observer site