FCC ruled that HEC equivalence does not guarantee university admission

The Federal Constitutional Court has ruled that having an HEC equivalence certificate does not guarantee university admission. According to the court, universities have the autonomy to set their own academic requirements. This decision was made in response to a petition filed by Altaf Hussain, who was denied admission to the MPhil programme at Punjab University despite having an equivalence certificate for his MBA degree from the Allama Iqbal Open University.

Hussain's petition was dismissed by a three-member bench of the court. The petitioner had argued that the HEC equivalence certificate should override provincial university requirements, but the court disagreed. The university had denied him admission because his degree did not meet their specific criteria of 25 courses with 75 credit hours.

The court's ruling upholds the autonomy of educational institutions in determining programme-specific eligibility. This means that universities can continue to set their own academic prerequisites, even if a student has obtained an HEC equivalence certificate.

Brief written by urgent.news from Daily Times, Dawn - Pakistan — 2 reports on this story. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.