Islamabad - The representative body of university teachers across Pakistan has expressed serious concerns over the proposed unilateral amendments in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Universities Act, terming it a blow to the autonomy of the Universities.
In a joint statement, Secretary General Federation of all Pakistan Universities Academic Staff Association (FAPUASA) Dr Kaleemullah Berach and Dr Fazli Nasir, President FAPUASA Khyber Pakhtunkhwa said that the stakeholders ought to be taken into confidence about any change.
The proposed changes, they said, would create extreme unrest in the academic community on and off the campus and will disturb the peaceful atmosphere of the institutions of higher education.
They said that university faculty is of the opinion that the proposed amendment tantamount to taking away the autonomy of the universities and if there are any amendments necessary these should be brought to the fora of experts and stakeholders of higher education and should be logical.
They also informed that this issue would also be discussed during the important meeting of executive body of FAPUASA scheduled to be held on April 5, 2015 in Islamabad and compressive straggly would be chalked out by the university faculty in this regard.
After detailed deliberations, the general body meeting of FAPUASA Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has already termed KP Universities Act 2012 and the Bill of Proposed Amendments a blow to the autonomy of the Universities.
Furthermore, all the members agreed that the Peshawar University Act 2012, which was implemented on 5th of January, 2012, had better be extended to the rest of universities. If the government is interested in any amendments, it may be brought in the University of Peshawar Act 2012 after taking all the stakeholders into confidence.
The members agreed that they would use every legitimate tool in their stock in order to get such an Act passed for all the Universities. In case the Bill gets passed, FAPUASA would go on strike and in case anything untoward happens, the government and not the universities’ employees would be responsible.