ISLAMABAD        -           The National Assembly (NA) body monitoring the federal education on Tuesday deferred five bills presented on forum due to non-availability of the movers.  

Meeting of the NA Standing Committee of Federal Education and Professional Training (FE&PT) met here under the chairmanship of Member National Assembly (MNA) Mian Najeeb Ud Din Awais.  The committee had five bills out of thirteen points on agenda and all were deferred because movers were not present in the meeting .The bills were deferred second time and the body decided to discuss the bills on arrival of the movers.

One of the movers of the bill was Federal Minister for Education Shafqat Mehmood who was not present in the meeting, while three were proposed by Member National Assembly (MNA) Syed Fakhar Imam.  The committee on agenda had to discuss The Pakistan Academy of Letters (Amendment) Bill, 2019, moved by Minister for Federal Education Shafqat Mehmood and The Pakistan Academy of Letters (Amendment) Bill, 2019, moved by Muhammad Sana Ullah Khan Masti Khel.

MNA Syed Fakhar Imam had moved three bills including The Pakistan National Council of Arts Amendment Bill 2019, The National Vocational and Technical Training Commission (Amendment) Bill, 2019 and The Islamabad Capital Territory Private Educational Institutions (Registration and Regulation) (Amendment) Bill 2019.

Chairman Committee Mian Najeeb Ud Din Awaisi when asked about deferring of bills for the second time he said that the committee deferred it because the movers were not present.

The committee also discussed the administrative problems at International Islamic University Islamabad (IIUI) and Quaid-i-Azam University (QAU) and referred it to a sub –committee to discuss and prepare a report.  The committee took strict notice over the financial, managerial issues and political, nepotism-based inductions in the public sector universities and decided to bring detailed report from the Higher Education Commission (HEC) regarding the accurate number of employees at each public sector higher educational institution.

Parliamentary Secretary for Federal Education, Wajiha Akram in a meeting said the inductions in the universities had been made against the set rules and regulation of HEC.

In the past, she said the new inductions were made in the universities on political and nepotism basis. She called for an accountability of the universities besides providing them autonomy.

Wajiha suggested that additional employees of the universities should be sent to surplus schools.

The committee on the suggestions of its members constituted a sub-committee on the issue and directed to present a detailed report regarding the financial, managerial issues and inductions on political basis in the next meeting. Briefing the committee on the proposed budget of FDE for 2020/21, Acting Director General Federal Directorate of Education Umair Javed said that PC-I was being prepared for the renovation of old ones and establishment of new building of 175 schools.

He said that remaining schools would be renovated and upgraded in the next Public Sector Development Programme. He said that 1,600 scholarships would be reserved for students to get admission in the FDE schools and colleges.  Around 200 classrooms would be linked with e-learning system, he said adding that technology would also be purchased for smart classrooms through open tendering.

Representatives from the education ministry told the committee that under an agreement, all madrassahs (seminaries) would be registered with the education ministry.