ISLAMABAD - Federal Urdu University of Arts, Science and Technology (FUUAST) and International Islamic University Islamabad (IIUI) students on Thursday protested against fee hike by the administration and demanded its withdrawal.
Dozens of FUUAST students gathered outside its Islamabad campus and protested against increased fee by the administration. The students held sloganeering against the fee hike and demanded from the administration to withdraw it as already students are facing financial burden.
A FUUAST student Ahmed Ali said that the university administration has increased the fee by Rs15,007 per semester and this has been done without any notice.
Details said the FUUAST has increased fee by Rs15,000. The BS semester fee has been increased from Rs40,000 and the new semester fees was increased to Rs55,700.
Students said that tuition fee was increased from Rs40,000 to Rs44,500 while miscellaneous charges were increased by Rs4,200 and transport charges were increased by Rs7,000.
Students protested against the increase in fee and demanded that the increase be withdrawn and transport charges be reduced, whereas, transport charges should be taken from the students who use the transport facility.
The protesting students also said that the university is charging the highest transport fee but the capacity of buses is not enough.
The university spokesperson said that FUUSAT is currently suffering from a financial crisis and the funds given by the government are held in Karachi and fee is being increased under financial stress.
Meanwhile, a group of students at IIUI also protested outside the administration block and demanded a decrease in the tuition fee along with provision of other facilities to students.
Students carrying placards against the administration officials said that instead of being on their seats to solve the problems, the officers are mostly not available to students.
In their written demands, the protesting students said that the IIUI administration should immediately reduce the tuition and hostel fee. They also said that new hostels should be built to meet the strength of students while the Kuwait hostel should be renovated as well. Students also demanded that the amount being deducted from the Ehsas Scholarship in the name of transport should be returned to students and the administration should also restore study tours as well.
Students also said that the administration should open the I-10 side gate of the university and an audit of the allotments done in the university hostels should be conducted for transparency.
The protesting students said that if the university administration didn’t resolve the matters of the students, they would start a daily sit-in outside the administration block. 
Educationist Tahir Malik talking to The Nation said that the universities are facing financial crunch like the entire country, however, unfortunately the public sector university students are facing direct pressure of fee hike.
He said that in recent days, Quaid-i-Azam University had increased the fee, however, later compensated students after their protest and now the same issue has emerged in other public sector universities of the city as well.
Tahir Malik said that the government should give a bailout package to the higher education sector as most students in public sector universities cannot afford paying hefty fee while universities also do not have alternate financial models to run their expenses.