Miscellaneous
House panel: Halt affiliations from foreign varsities
It also decides to form a sub-panel to determine possible measures for reforms of higher education systemA parliamentary committee has directed the government not to allow academic institutions at home to run programmes with affiliations from foreign universities/ institutions for the time being.
A meeting of the Women, Children, Senior Citizens and Social Welfare Committee of the Legislature-Parliament on Thursday instructed the Ministry of Education to bar institutions from running academic programmes with affiliations from international universities.
The meeting also agreed to form a sub-panel to determine possible measures for the overall management and reform of higher education system in the country and sought the suspension of the permission to colleges to run programmes with affiliations from foreign universities/ academic institutions in the country until the sub-committee submits it report.
The decision is, however, is not applicable to those institutions which are already running academic programmes with affiliations from foreign universities.
The parliamentary committee decided to look into the business of foreign universities in the country, following public complaints that they were charging exorbitantly.
The 11-member House subcommittee comprises Ganeshman Gurung, Baburam Pokhrel, Umesh Shrestha, Shreemaya Thakali, Nisha Shah, Sharada Poudel, Tejulal Chalal Chaudhary, Ramhari Subedi, Laxman Rajbanshi, Anandidevi Pant and Badri Pandey.
The sub-committee has been asked to submit its reports within 15 days.
During the meeting, lawmakers had drawn the attention of Minister for Education Dhaniram Poudel to the delay in bringing the Higher Education Policy in line with the new constitution and lack of monitoring.
Minister Poudel said that the Ministry of Education had already introduced a 19-point action plan in order to bring about reforms in the entire education sector and is working accordingly.