AIOU admissions 2009 | HEC Scholarship funds

AIOU announced admission schedule for Spring-2009 Semester
Islamabad, Feb 02: Allama Iqbal Open University (AIOU) has announced that admissions to the Spring-2009 Semester will start from February 6 throughout Pakistan and some Middle Eastern countries.

Admissions will be offered to the B.A, Intermediate, matriculation and Allisan-ul Arabi programme only. In Pakistan admissions are also being offered in Ph D, MS, and M Phil leading to Ph D in Education and statistics with three different specializations.

AIOU is also offering four-year degree programme in microbiology of international standard.

The admissions will also be offered in MS, M Phil, MSc honours, MS (Computer Science), MSc, MBA and MBA/MPA(Executive), MA, Med, Post-graduate diploma courses Bachelor's Programme, Teachers' Training Programme (PTC, ATTC), Intermediate, Matriculation, Daras-i-Nizami, Certificate Courses, Technical Agricultural courses, Open-Tech courses and Short-Term Educational Programmes.

Admission forms will be available in Admissions Department of the university in Sector H-8, 36 regional offices and more than one hundred coordination offices thought the country.

Admission forms along with prescribed fee may be submitted in all branches of Habib Bank Ltd, Bank Alfalah, First Women Bank and Allied Bank while only nominated branches of National Bank of Pakistan will receive admissions form and fees. The News

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Thousands of students' studying under the HEC Scholarship Scheme have their future at stake
Islamabad: The future of thousands of students is at stake, as HEC could not release the pledged funds to the students studying under the HEC Scholarship Scheme within the country as well as in foreign institutions, it was learnt reliably on Friday.

Owing to negligence on the part of the authorities concerned, currently more than 4,000 students in the foreign universities are badly suffering from scarcity of funds, as they have received serious warning notices for early submission of dues from their respective universities.

It is relevant to mention here that the same numbers of the students, studying under Indigenous HEC Scholarship Programme, have also become victims of this oblivion on part of HEC across the country.

The government has not released third quarter of HEC funds amounting to Rs 3.5 billions yet, which has resulted in unpleasant situation for the students who are studying under HEC scholarship scheme across the globe, authentic sources revealed.

Earlier, the government had approved massive cut on HEC funds. Due to fund shortages HEC decided to shelve its Human Resource Department for the unidentified period, under which scholarship was being awarded to the deserving students.

HEC Chairperson Begum Shehnaz Wazir Ali, when contacted, said that foreign scholars would be protected at every cost. She further said, "I and my government would provide every kind of protection to the HEC scholars throughout their studies." To a query, she replied that due to prevailing financial crisis, HEC was partially affecting from fund shortages. She said that government would fulfil its commitments.

The sources further told that students, studying in foreign universities, had been facing serious consequences due to stoppage of funds, as they were living in miserable conditions. They were not able to meet their daily expenses there, as they were restricted to earn by the said universities, sources informed.

Those students who are enrolled in the US and UK universities could not pay their fee of this semester. It is difficult for them to do jobs to meet their daily life expenses with their tough studies schedule.

They said that as per the rule of the said institutes a student couldn't work more than a few hours.

One of the HEC officials on the condition of anonymity said that the discriminatory behaviour of the present government towards HEC was being justified by the HEC high-ups.

He said that government did not stop the salaries of the employees of the commission on condition of their silence over the government cruel decision to rolling back the entire system of the commission established back in 2002.

The source further told that earlier HEC bigwigs were reluctant to accept the government decision but when they got assurance of their jobs security they since then had been advocating the government's each and every irrational decisions without realising the consequences of their blind support for the government.

Dr Mukhtar Ahmad, Member Operations and planning HEC, when contacted said that entire country was suffering through financial crunch so one could not see the HEC in isolation. To a query, he said that the HEC had no other option but to obey the government decision, as they were servants of the government. He was optimistic regarding the positive response from the government side. He lauded the HEC Chairperson role in uplifting the Commission. The Nation

Budgetary crisis - VCs to approach HEC
Peshawar: Vice chancellors of public sector universities of NWFP on Saturday discussed the issue of severe budgetary crisis faced by the universities and decided to approach the Higher Education Commission (HEC) to resolve the issue of cuts in the budget of universities by the federal government. A meeting of the vice chancellors of public sector universities of the province was held here with Vice Chancellor NWFP University of Engineering and Technology (UET) Engineer Syed Imtiaz Hussain Gilani in chair.

The meeting was told that the issue would also be brought into the notice of NWFP Governor Owais Ghani, who is also the chancellor of NWFP universities. In his opening remarks, Imtiaz Gilani said the universities had been interacting with HEC but the situation was becoming untenable for higher education institutions and universities in the province. "In the backdrop of the recent slash in higher education budget, there is a shortfall of more than one billion rupees in the recurrent budget, and more than two billion rupees in the development budget.

This shortfall of funds has occurred in the already approved federal government budget for the year 2007-08," he added.

The vice chancellors expressed concerns over the Public Service Development Programme (PSDP) allocations for the year 2009-10 and submitted their demands for 2009-10 budget allocations. Representatives and vice chancellors of University of Peshawar, Frontier Women University, Agricultural University Peshawar, Gomal University DI Khan, Kohat University of Science and Technology, Bannu University of Science and Technology, Hazara University, Malakand University, Chakdara University, Khyber Medical University, and Islamia College University attended the meeting. Daily Times

Convocation of Home Economics College held
Peshawar: Almost 200 students were awarded their B.Sc degrees for the 2006 and 2007 sessions at a colourful ceremony of the 15th Convocation of College of Home Economics, University of Peshawar on Saturdy. Apart from two toppers of the respective sessions, who were awarded gold medals, for the first time eight students were awarded special souvenirs for taking top position in B. Sc part I, II, III and IV. Saman Arif for the session 2006 and Faiza Mufti for the session 2007 were awarded gol medalists. While eight other students who were given the souvenirs areNazish Hina, Bushra Zaman, Faiza Mufti and Saman Arif for session 2006, while Saman Wali Sani, Ayesha Shafi, Aiman Gul and Faiza Shamim were awarded souvenirs for session 2007.

Chief guest on the occasion Professor Dr. Muhammad Iqbal, Deam faculty of numerical and physical sciences, University of Peshawar awarded the prizes. In his speech he congratulated the students and also hailed the services of the College of Home Economics for providing quality education to the womenfolk. He said that the future of Pakistan is linked with an educated society and the womenfolk should be given its proper status in this regard.

Principal of the College of Home Economics Dr. Fanila Far in his inaugural speech threw light on different aspects of the college while presenting the annual report. She lauded the services of ex-principal of the college late Dr. Simin Masud for her services she rendered for the betterment of the college. Dr. Simin Masud was awarded with a special prize for her services which was received by her daughter. While talking to The Frontier Post Saman Arif and Faiza Mufti, the two gold medalists, attributed their success to the prayers of their parents and hardwork of their teachers. Dr. Shah Jehan Syed, chairman Department of Journalism and Mass Communication was also present on the occasion. F.P. Report

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FDE's decision to send teachers to home provinces criticised
Islamabad: A recent decision of the Federal Directorate of Education (FDE) to repatriate all teachers currently working in the federal government schools in the capital on deputation to their respective provinces or regions after completion of five years has sent a shock wave among the educators, particularly women.

Sources said the FDE was under pressure from ruling politicians to appoint their people and the decision to send back all teachers on deputation was aimed to create vacancies for accommodating the political appointees. So far over 20 teachers have been directed to relinquish work and report back to their respective provinces.

It may be noted that majority of the teachers on deputation are women whose husbands are working in various government departments and private organisations and are posted in the capital. Taking benefit of existing rules facilitating posting of government servants in areas where their spouses lived or worked, hundreds of women from various parts of the country have moved to the capital and some of them have already been regularised by the FDE.

The affected female teachers said that the move taken by the FDE was arbitrary, anti-women and above all politically motivated. They said on the one hand the PPP government was claiming to be striving for creating job opportunities in the country and was also reinstating sacked government employees but on the other it was taking such steps which would shut the doors of employment on a large number of teachers, especially women.

They said in order to avoid disturbance in their family lives, a large number of women teachers had come to the capital on deputation and now their children were also studying in various educational institutions here. They said due to family constraints, they had sacrificed a number of allowances and other job benefits which they were otherwise entitled to and had been working on the same scale without promotion because as long as they are on deputation they are not included in the seniority list.

"Sending us back to our provinces would mean an end to our careers, because we will not be in a position to go to our areas leaving our children back here," they added.

They said the new director-general of the FDE, a senior joint secretary at the Ministry of Education, had no authority to take such a decision because it was against rules under which government employees were entitled to get themselves posted in areas where their spouses worked.

They said earlier the facility was available only to those employees whose spouses were also in government jobs. But in 2006, through a special notification titled "Posting of married female government servants at the place of residence/posting of their husbands who are not in government employment", the federal government also extended the facility to those employees whose spouses worked in the private sector.

The notification dated April 21, 2006, says, "Keeping in view the socio-economic problems and hardships faced by husbands and wives in government service due to posting at different stations of duty, the Establishment Division issued instructions/guidelines vide its O.M. No 10/30/97-R-2, dated 13.5.1998 and 17.12.1999 to facilitate posting of husbands and wives at the same station and the posting of unmarried female civil servants at the place of residence of their parents/families. With a view to also facilitate those female government servants whose spouses are not in government service or working in private sector or are unemployed, it has been decided to extend the facility to this class of government servants too to enable them to serve at the residence of their spouses irrespective of whether such spouses are employed with the government, private sector or even unemployed."

The teachers said under the existing rules, after completion of five years of deputation teachers were regularised depending on their performance. They said this gave the teachers a chance to spend the remaining period of their service with their families and also motivated them to improve their performance. As a result, majority of the teachers on deputation showed 100 per cent result. They said during the summer vacation last year, about 20 teachers on deputation were regularised by the FDE.

They said if implemented the new decision would put the professional future of a large number of women at risk. They called upon the president, the prime minister and the federal minister for education to restrain the FDE from taking the unilateral decision and save the teachers from mental trauma which the move had caused to them.

When contacted, a spokesman for the FDE, however, clarified that power to extend the deputation period after five years rested with the Establishment Division. He said even after completion of three years' deputation, further extension was granted by the secretary education. Under the existing rules, he added, maximum period for deputation was five years. After completion of this period, the FDE sends the summary for further extension to the Establishment Division from where it goes to the prime minister for final approval. He said in some recent cases the Establishment Division had turned down the FDE requests seeking extension in the deputation period of teachers.

About absorption after the five-year deputation period, the spokesman said this policy was applied only to teachers in scales 9 and 14 depending on the availability of seats against the deputation quota and the teacher's satisfactory performance. Dawn

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