Federal govt cuts HEC budget for 1.5%

KARACHI: The federal government has decreased the Higher Education Commission’s (HEC) budget by 1.5% for the fiscal year 2023-24, ARY News reported on Thursday.

The Higher Education Commission (HEC) has reduced the grant for federal-administered universities across the country by 1.5% for FY2023-24.

The education authorities approved a cut in funding to federal-administered universities in all four provinces in FY2023-24, whereas, the approved grant for FY2022-23 was also disbursed in June with a 5% cut.

The HEC deducted Rs100 million from the approved grant for the universities. Rs450 million was cut from the annual grant of the Urdu University.

On the other hand, the provincial HEC recommended to increase grants for the Sindh universities. The high education sector is currently facing serious financial problems, therefore, the provincial government hiked the grant from Rs14 billion to Rs21 billion for FY2023-24.

The HEC Sindh approved an increase in the grant to NED University from Rs690 million to Rs1.14 billion, Mehran University from Rs970 million to Rs1.45 billion, Dow Medical University from Rs550 million to Rs890 million, University of Karachi from Rs1.49 billion to Rs2.46 billion and Lyari University from Rs120 million to Rs180 million.

The grant for Daud Engineering University was increased from Rs830 million to Rs1.11 billion and for Sindh University Jamshoro, the grant was hiked from Rs1.42 billion to Rs1.93 billion.