Daily Times

The Higher Education Commission (HEC) evaluation committee has recommended suspension of 34 MPhil/MS and PhD programmes of Islamia University Bahawalpur (IUB) after finding “enormous level of deficiencies”.

According to documents, a seven-member HEC review committee headed by Dr Yousuf Khushk, pro vice chancellor of Shah Abdul Latif University, examined total of 73 MPhil/MS and PhD degree programmes. Out of them, 8 programmes were recommended to be completely halted, while 26 others were given the status of “stopping further intake”.

The halted MPhil/MS degree disciplines included history, Islamic studies and Pakistan studies. Similarly, the 17 MPhil/MS degree for which the further admissions were stopped included applied psychology, bio technology, botany, chemistry, computer science, computer system engineering, economics, English literature, English linguistic, Islamic studies, pharmaceutical chemistry, pharmacology, pharmacy practice, Urdu, Iqbaliat, wildlife and zoology.

Further intake was stopped for PhD degree programmes in disciplines included Arabic, botany, computer science, Islamic studies, mathematics, media sciences, pharmaceutical chemistry and pharmaceutics.

Similarly, the committee suggested complete halt of PhD in biochemistry, history, Islamic studies, Pakistan studies and pharmacology.

According to the report compiled by the committee, most of the halted programmes had shortage of required faculty, while those who existed were less experienced. On the other hand, the committee recommended stoppage of admissions on the basis of excessive student enrollment.

As per the HEC rules, there is a requirement of appointing at least three full-time relevant PhD faculty members for launching a PhD programme and at least two full-time relevant PhD holders for launching an MPhil/MS/equivalent programme.

Surprisingly, despite several pointed loopholes, the IUB has announced admissions for new semester. When contacted to get version, acting IUB VC Dr Amir Ijaz did not respond. However, spokesperson Shahzad Ahmed Khalid said that after the pointing out of deficiencies by the HEC committee, internal committees of the varsity were working on this issue to mend them as soon as possible.

Moreover, Khalid claimed, “We have recently advertised over 100 vacancies to meet faculty shortage. The university will definitely fulfil deficiencies in pointed departments and then announce admissions.”

Besides convener, the other members of the review committee consisted of Dr Adnan Sarwar Khan of the National University of Modern Languages, Islamabad, Dr Bushra Mirza of Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad, Dr Farman Ullah of Agriculture University, Peshawar, Dr Farooq e Azam Cheema of Bahria University, Karachi, Dr Muhammad Ramzan of University of Central Punjab, Lahore, and Muhammad Ali Baig, an HEC representative.

According to the committee report, the university has a total of 35 PhD programmes and total enrollment of 846 PhD students, while there are 48 MPhil/MS/Equivalent programmes with enrollment of 1,983 students. For these academic programmes, the IUB has a total of 230 PhD qualified faculty members and 52 MPhil/MS/equivalent faculty members.

The committee recommended in the drafted report that for all those programmes having the statuses of “further intake stopped” or “halted” in this report, the university must immediately cancel the fresh admissions and the fee be returned to all the students affected by this action. However, according to sources, the varsity so far has not complied with this recommendation of the committee.

A PhD supervisor can supervise a total of 12 MS/MPhil/PhD students at a time with no more than five PhD students. At the IUB, students were being supervised by the supervisor from other departments, having different specialisations. Moreover, as per the graduate rules of the university, only the PhD qualified faculty can supervise research scholars. However, the report said that MPhil qualified faculty was also found to have been engaged in supervising research scholars. Though the HEC has allowed for MPhil/MS qualified faculty to supervise MPhil/MS research students, the university has not yet revised its graduate rules to avail this permission.

In a few cases, it was noted by the committee that the foreign qualified PhD faculty had not yet obtained the equivalency from the HEC.

Moreover, it was assessed during interaction with the faculty and research students that most of the faculty and students were found to have been less motivated towards research endeavors due to lack of financial incentives and institutional support for purchase/import of consumables. Besides this, the HEC digital library facility was available for research scholars, but it has very limited utilisation by the students.

The committee recommended that the HEC library usage should be encouraged by organising orientation seminars for teachers and students.

The committee also recommended that an entry test/admission committee at the University level must be formulated with intimation to the HEC, as per the HEC guidelines.

No official was available in the HEC for version. However, an official said while wishing anonymity that action had not been officially finalised yet, and talks between the university and HEC were in process for the purpose.