PESHAWAR: While expressing his satisfaction on the overall progress on the establishment of new colleges in the province, Chief Minister Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Mahmood Khan on Friday directed the concerned authorities to expedite the process of land acquisitions for new colleges in the province and to take all the necessary steps in coordination with the concerned Deputy Commissioners to resolve all the issues of land acquisitions for colleges within one week time period.
The work on the establishment of a number of new colleges in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa is in progress with the aim to ensure the availability of higher education facilities to the student of the province at their door steps by strengthening the higher education sector on sound footings. Establishment of 15 new colleges across the province has been completed and classes will formally be launched in those colleges from the start of the coming academic session. Whereas work on the establishment of 25 more colleges is in final stages which would be completed during the upcoming financial year.
This was told in a meeting held here on Friday with Chief Minister Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Mahmood Khan in the chair to review progress on the establishment of new colleges across the province. The meeting was given a detailed presentation on the progress made so far on the ongoing and new schemes of colleges in the province. Besides Special Assistant to CM on Higher Education Kamran Bangash and Secretary Higher Education Muhammad Daud, other concerned high ups also attended the meeting.
The meeting was informed that overall, 63 colleges were under construction in the province including the newly merged districts out of which 32 were girls and 31 were boys colleges adding that work on the provision of missing facilities in 326 colleges of the province is also in progress.
It was further informed that establishment of Government Girls Degree College Jalozai, Government Girls Degree College Tarkha, Government Degree College Barawal, Government Girls Degree College Ougi, Government Degree College Koh-e-Daman, Government Girls Degree College Malambutt, Government Girls Degree College Par Hoti, Government Degree College Kotha, Government Girls Degree College Banda Daud Shah, Government Degree College Gandaf, Government Degree College Kot, Government Girls Degree College Billi Tang, Government Girls Degree College Home Economics Mardan, Government Girls Degree College Adenzai and Government College of Management Sciences (Women) Swabi had been completed.
He further directed the authority concerned to ensure physical progress on all the projects of colleges as per the given timelines and to carry out a study for the next five years requirements of new colleges in the province so that realistic planning could be made in this regard keeping in view the future requirements of the province. He further directed the concerned quarters to reflect a developmental scheme in the new Annual Development Program to provide transport facilities to the student of colleges in the province.
Similarly, he also directed the authorities concerned to include an ADP scheme in the upcoming budget to convert a University campus in Lower Dir to a full fledge University. The chair directed the high ups of higher education department to work out a feasible plan to launch MS classes in certain disciplines in the colleges of far-flung areas so that the facility could be extended to the student of remote areas in their home districts and resultantly efficient use of government financial resources could also be ensured.
Mahmood Khan remarked that the incumbent provincial government would establish new colleges as well as Universities where ever it was genuinely required but would not spent public exchequer just for its political gains. He further directed the high ups of higher education department to work out a strategy to launch information Technology and Business Management Classes as well in the existing Home Economic Colleges of the province.