450 MPhil - PhD programmes closed across Pakistan: HEC
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ISLAMABAD - HEC has closed down 450 MS, MPhil and PhD programmes for not fulfilling the set criteria.
Chairman HEC Dr Mukhtar has said.
He was briefing Ministry of Federal Education and Professional Training Secretary Akbar Hussain Durrani on the functions, powers, initiatives and achievements of HEC since its inception in 2002 during a meeting here on Friday.
The meeting was also attended by HEC Executive Director Dr Arshad Ali and senior management of the commission. Dr Mukhtar said that the HEC, earlier used to be the University Grants Commission, was initially tasked to improve equitable access to the higher education, ensure quality, and relevance of research to the country’s needs.
He said that Pakistan had only 59 universities before 2002, while gross enrolment was only 2.6 per cent.
He maintained that the number of PhDs at that time was only 3,110 and only 800 research publications could surface from Pakistan. He said the number of universities has now reached 188, whereas the gross enrolment was currently nine per cent.
He said that the country presently has 11,960 PhDs and the female enrolment has increased from 32 per cent in 2002 to 48 per cent in 2017.
He said that various HEC divisions including accreditation and attestation, human resource development, research and development, travel grants, academics, quality assurance, administration and coordination, information technology and planning and development perform their respective assignments with professional efficiency and dedication.
