KATHMANDU: Prime Minister Balendra (Balen) Shah has issued a stern directive to the leadership of the country’s higher education institutions, ordering a ruthless crackdown on financial arrears, property encroachment and political interference within academic premises.

The instructions were delivered during a high-level briefing held today at the Office of the Prime Minister and Council of Ministers in Singha Durbar, where the Prime Minister engaged with newly appointed Vice-Chancellors to review deep-seated challenges and execute urgent institutional reforms across Nepal’s university system.

In direct response to the Prime Minister’s firm stance, the newly appointed Vice-Chancellors issued a joint pledge to completely ban political activities, including disruptive student union operations, to safeguard the academic environment from further degradation.

The university heads collectively committed to insulating faculty, administrative staff, and students from party politics, vowing to redirect institutional focus entirely toward creative, disciplined, and purely academic pursuits.

Addressing the structural concerns raised during the briefings, Prime Minister Shah instructed university authorities to take immediate, uncompromising legal actions to reclaim billions of rupees worth of university-owned lands that have been unlawfully occupied or encroached upon over the years.

He further ordered administrators to aggressively clear the massive backlog of unresolved financial arrears to restore fiscal sanity to the institutions.

In a major structural shift aligning with the spirit of federalism, the Prime Minister also directed university administrations to decentralize convocation ceremonies—which have historically been restricted to the federal capital—and host them across all seven provinces to ensure convenience for thousands of local students and parents.

To make higher education more equitable and accessible, the high-level dialogue finalized a binding decision requiring all constituent campuses and privately affiliated colleges to provide a mandatory, 100% scholarship to at least ten percent of hardworking and targeted student groups.

Furthermore, the universities committed to strictly adhering to the National Academic Calendar approved by the Ministry of Education and Sports through the University Grants Commission.

Under this rigid new framework, admissions, classroom teachings, and examinations must be conducted strictly on schedule, with an absolute requirement to publish final examination results within a maximum of one month after testing concludes.

Solidarizing with the Prime Minister’s directives, Minister for Education and Sports Sasmit Pokharel ordered the Vice-Chancellors to submit a comprehensive and clear action plan within the next seven days detailing their implementation strategies.

Minister Pokharel emphasized that all Vice-Chancellors must function as a single team to overhaul the national education sector, noting that integrated coordination is essential as technical issues like college affiliations and academic transfers are heavily interconnected.

The meeting concluded with the active participation of the Vice-Chancellors representing Tribhuvan University, Far-Western University, Purbanchal University, Pokhara University, Rajarshi Janak University, Mid West University, and the Agriculture and Forestry University.