Degrees of 46 lawmakers found to be fake

Higher Education Commission (HEC) has declared 46 degrees of parliamentarians bogus, in addition to this decision on eleven degrees is awaited by the court of law. Advisor to HEC, Dr Saeed Mahmmud Raza stated this in a press conference on Monday. Following the directive of prime minister, he said the commission had submitted the report on degrees to federal minister for education Sardar Aseff Ahmed.
"Prime minister is the final authority under the HEC ordinance 2002 and we are following the directives of the Premier," he added. He maintained that 224 degrees of parliamentarians have been cleared by the universities, so far and expressed the hope that the process of verifications of degrees would be completed within two-week time. To expedite the process, universities were now directly contacting the parliamentarians demanding degrees and other relevant documents for verifications. "HEC is extending the assistance to these universities in case of any difficulty," he added.
Advisor negated the impression that foreign universities were not co-operating in verifications of foreign degrees. "Foreign universities conveyed us to adopt their procedures in verifications of foreign degrees and we are doing the same," he said.
He also informed the media about certain decision taken in 23rd Commission's meeting chaired by Dr Javed Laghari. He said universities assured the commission of their full co-operation to make process of degrees' verification foolproof. The meeting also expressed dismay over cut in government grant which forced the institutions to close educational projects, he said.
To another question, HEC Adviser Professor Dr Riaz Hussain Qureshi replied that due to non-availability of budgetary allocations, HEC had to slash scholarship programme. He said HEC might not offer fresh M Phil or PhD scholarships unless government allocates required budget.
"We demanded Rs 22.5 billion to meet the development expenditure and were provided only half of the amount during the last fiscal year. Situation is even worse this year, government granted Rs 15.7 billion for development and non-development projects against demand of Rs 35 billion," he added.