ludUO

decision to establish new universities and lack of adequate funding from the
HEC. Sources at Peshawar University claimed that only 50% of the total
committed funds for 2011-2012 were released to the university. As many as
70 public sector universities were also facing financial difficulty due to nonreceipt
of funds from the HEC. However, media reports highlighted that HEC
was also facing difficulties because the government had not paid it funds to
the tune of Rs. 9 billion for the year 2011-2012.
In November the Punjab government launched the Punjab Accelerated
Literacy Promotion (PALP) programme which aimed at educating and providing
technical skills to the population which was usually denied access to education,
such as transgender persons, prisoners and child labourers. As a part of the
programme, the Literacy and Non-formal Basic Education Department was to
open 4,236 new non-formal basic education schools in 32 districts, as well as
adopt 1,204 exiting schools, to enroll 190,000 children for formal education
from grades one to five.
Violence on campus
While student unions in the country were once credited for serving as
nurseries for preparing students for participation in the democratic political
process, in the last few decades student politics has been a very violent affair
with groups affiliated with political parties facing off in turf wars.
Violence by student/political groups on campus continued in 2012. The
murder of Professor Basheer Ahmed Channar of the Sindh University led to
protests by teachers and students demanding a judicial inquiry. The teachers’
association in particular demanded removal of Rangers and police from the
Question in the homework led to this.
227
State of Human Rights in 2012