SIALKOT: Foreign Minister Khawaja Muhammad Asif on Saturday stressed the need for provision of quality education to students.
He was addressing the participants in a laptop distribution ceremony held at the Govt College for Women University (GCWU), Sialkot.
He said that it was the prime obligation of everyone to help secure educational future of students by opening doors of quality education on them and providing them with maximum opportunities of gaining knowledge.
He said that promotion of education was a must to make Pakistan and the Pakistani nation the best in every sphere of life, and enabling the country to stand in the comity of educationally developed nations.
The minister said that promotion of quality education is top priority of the government. He said that students were the future of the country and the government was providing them maximum facilities, and enabling them to serve the nation and the country in a better way. The minister pledged an early and amicable solution to the university’s problems and provision of missing facilities.
On this occasion, Higher Education Commission (HEC) Chairman Dr Mukhtar Ahmed said that the commission had been playing a pivotal role in promotion of quality education, knowledge and knowledge-based economy through ensuring access to quality higher education at local level.
The chairman said that the number of HEC recognised universities had increased to 188 with 1.4 million students studying there. He said that the number of universities was only 59 in the country in 2002, and only 276,000 students were getting education there. “Girl students are 42 per cent of the total 1.4 million students now studying in all 188 HEC recognised universities across-the-country,” he said.
He said the annual budget of HEC had been increased to Rs 107 billion, as the commission had been giving educational scholarships, both foreign and indigenous, to 251,000 students for getting the higher education.
He hailed the efforts and services of GCWU Sialkot for promotion of higher education among the local students. The foreign minister also distributed laptops among 40 brilliant students of the university in the third phase of Prime Minister’s Laptop Scheme. As many as 481 laptops have been distributed among the brilliant students of GCWU under the PM’s Laptops Scheme until now.
Higher Education Department (HED) Punjab Chairman Dr Nizamuddin, Govt College Women University (GCWU) Sialkot Vice Chancellor Dr Farhat Saleemi, Prime Minister’s Youth Programme Chairperson Naila Khan, MNA Sahibazada Syed Iftikharul Hassan Shah, MPAs Chaudhry Muhammad Ikram, Rana Muhaamad Afzal, Muhammad Asif Bajwa, Mohsin Ashraf, Chaudhry, Arshad Javed Warraich, Mrs Gull Naz Pasha, Sialkot Municipal Corporation Mayor Chaudhry Tauheed Akhtar, Deputy Mayor Chaudhry Bashir, Sialkot District Council Chairperson Hina Arshad Warraich, Shujaat Ali Pasha, the PML-N Sialkot district general secretary, PML-N leaders Mian Ashfaq, Baber Khan, Aurang Zaib, Muhaamad Rafique Mughal, Muhammad Farooq Ghumman, president PML-N Youth Wing Gujranwala division, and PML-N Women Wing Sialkot president Nusrat Jamshaid Malik and others were also present on this occasion.
Published in Daily Times, November 12th 2017.
