The Higher Education Commission (HEC) has sent a request to the Ministry of Finance for providing additional funds, enabling the universities to enhance the salaries of their employees as per announcement made by the government.
Informed sources told Business Recorder here on Monday that for the current fiscal year 2012-13, the indicative budgetary ceilings of Rs 48.6 billion had been issued by the government against the commitment of 57.8 billion under the Medium Term Budgetary Framework (MTDF). Of this, Rs 48.6 billion allocated for 2012-13; Rs 32.7 billion is recurring grant while Rs 15.8 billion is the development grant.
"That is why the shortfall for the current fiscal year is Rs 3.4 billion in recurrent and Rs 5.8 billion in development grant. The total shortfall in allocated budgetary funds is Rs 9.2 billion," sources said. Sources said the government had granted 20 percent ad-hoc relief allowance, increase in pension and conveyance allowance to the employees, financial impact of which comes to Rs 5.9 billion for federally funded higher education institutions.
"The additional impact on account of salary increase can not be accommodated within the allocated budgetary provisions and universities are not in the position to pay 20 percent ad-hoc relief allowance to their employees and pensioners. This situation has created unrest among the academia and the other staff of the universities that may lead to the default of some universities," sources added. Sources said total outlay of the HEC budget for the last fiscal year 2011-12 was agreed to be Rs 48 billion (Rs 31.5 billion as recurring and Rs 16.5 billion as development grant) by the government, but the accrual releases remained just Rs 38.6 billion (Rs 28.8 billion as recurring and Rs 9.7 billion as development grant) indicating a shortfall of Rs 9.3 billion in 2011-12.
Sources added that under Tertiary Education Support Project (TESP) agreed with the World Bank, the Bank is committed to provide 300 million dollars soft loan for three years for universities in three equal annual instalments, while in response the Commission had to meet 10 disbursement link indicators (DLIs) including: 1) Allocation and timely release of recurrent and development funds to HEC under the agreement. 2) 445 scholars to be awarded under the indigenous postgraduate scholarships programme in the first year of the programme. 3) 849 teachers to be recruited on Tenure Track System. 4) All affiliated colleges need to meet the minimum quality standard set by the HEC. 5) Provision of enhanced quality education at Masters' level for external students. 6) Enhancing research, innovation and commercialisation performance. 7) Improving equitable access through the establishment of an effective student financial aid system. 8) Introducing a scorecard-based system for performance assessment of quality enforcement cells in public technical education institutes. 9) Number of higher education institutes (HEI) assessed (management). 10) Improved strategic management planning and accountability in public HEIs.
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