Balochistan, GB universities get Rs 285 mln allocation.

ISLAMABAD -- A special package of Rs.285 million has been separately allocated for universities of Balochistan and Gilgit Baltistan, over and above their normal allocation for the upcoming financial year 2020-21.

FATA University has also been prioritised and its allocation has been tripled, a press release Wednesday said.

The funding for all universities has been increased strictly on the basis of their performance, as indicated by the number of research publications by their faculty members, the number and amounts of the research grants received, the bandwidth utilized for access to digital libraries and Internet resources, the amount spent on conferences and professional travel, and the number of PhD faculty and PhD students.

Meanwhile, due to paucity of funds compared with the requirement, a principle decision has been taken by the Higher Education Commission (HEC) regarding newly established universities. During next year, no new university is being added to recurring grant stream of HEC.

Almost 20 newly established universities have approached HEC for funding from the next year. The inclusion of new universities would have resulted in a reduction of the allocations to older universities.

The Higher Education Commission had requested the federal government to allocate Rs.104.789 billion as recurring grant for FY 2020-21. The requirement includes funds for universities as well as for pursuing the HEC research agenda, the start of several new initiatives (NAHE, ETC, HEMIS, PERU, and P-15 Research Universities), funding for the Tenure Track Faculty, funding...