Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: The Higher Education Commission (HEC) is the regulatory body that formulates policies for the academia while it has no mandate to conduct tests in higher education institutions through its own created Education Testing Council (ETC), said the Chief Executive Officer (CEO), National Testing Service, Sherzada Khan, on Thursday.

While addressing a press conference, Khan said that the HEC had a very important role in making laws and policies for higher educational institutions both in the public and private sectors. However, the HEC did not need at the moment creating its own testing council. He added that it should just avail the prerogative (provided in the Higher Education Act 2002).

“Several times we requested the HEC for approaching them for conducting tests in the academia and the Commission should concentrate on its fundamental purpose of formulation instead of interference in such kind of jobs but the HEC management had paid no heed,” criticised Khan.

As per the act, the HEC has power mainly to formulate policies, guiding principles and the priorities for higher education institutions for the promotions of socio economics in the country. Moreover, the evaluation of the performance of the institutions and preparations through consultations with the institutions is the basic and important prerogative of the Commission while advising the federal and provincial governments on proposals for granting a charter to award degree in both public and private sectors is also another important authority of the HEC.

It is pertinent to mention here that the HEC had launched its ETC few months ago. The universities and Degree Awarding Institutions (DAIs) have been asked by the HEC to conduct tests for their admissions/scholarships under the ETC (instead NTS). As per the HEC claim the ETC would charge no fee or any kind of charges from the students.

The CEO, Khan, said that over 90 per cent government and private sector departments and universities were conducting their recruitment tests, admissions and scholarship tests through the NTS and they returned satisfied after availing the services of the NTS.

While quoting such departments, he cited the National Accountability Bureau (NAB), Intelligence Bureau (IB), and Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) as important departments including some other ministries and private sector institutions.

The NTS has its Board of Directors (BOD) that includes the academia, academic committee, subject committees and test item contributors. The COMSATS Institute of Information Technology (CIIT) was the major founder of NTS. As per information available, the Board of Governance (BOG) of CIIT decided in its 37th meeting in 2016 that all staff from the CIIT that is part of the NTS BOD, would be mentioned as ex-officio members.

The chief did not reply clearly when asked about the reasons for so many officials from only one educational institution, CITT, are part of NTS’s BOD.

As per NTS claims, it is a non-profit organisation. The chief said it was a purely public sector institution but not funded by the government adding that we arranged money through our own resources (in terms of charging fees).

If non-profit then why did the NTS charge fees from candidates who applied for jobs, admissions or scholarships. He claimed that the NTS charges the minimum cost of its expenses that is from Rs 300 to Rs 500 and it goes to Rs 1000 in some specific cases.

The NTS chief claimed that his institution had around 250 original employees while it conducts tests for 569 various departments. It is impossible for NTS to grant services through 250 employees he said adding that NTS hires paid staff on the need basis.

He admitted that NTS contains many flaws but over the time these are being mended, adding that some parliamentarians intended to spoil the name of this institution for charming their own NTS-like testing services which they have established. Khan, however, did not reveal the names of such parliamentarians. He said that the media should investigate the truth and they should avoid work on the agenda of such politicians.