Speaker National Assembly, Chaudhry Amir Hussain here on Wednesday said that education was a must to properly capitalise country's existing human resources for better and prosperous future.
Addressing the "Award Ceremony for Distant Students" by Sarhad University of Science and Information Technology (SUIT) here, the speaker said most of the country's population was under age 25 years, which he described as real capital for the country. Among others, the event was attended by Riaz Karim, President SUIT, Brigadier Javed Tipu, Vice President SUIT, members of the Board of Governors and of Academic Council, faculty members, students and parents.
He said, "like Indonesia, China and Malaysia, Pakistan, too has great human resources' potential, however, added there was a dire need that these resources are preserved by providing proper education to the young generation.
He said there could not be two opinions about the importance of education as no country could progress without educating its people adding that the advanced countries had achieved the goal of development by educating their people.
He said that Pakistan's human resources have to compete with that of the developed world adding that government has been working to enhance capacity building of human resources.
He, however, stressed the need for further strengthening the institutions and enhancing the standard of teaching in public as well as private sector and added that private sector had also been playing a vital role in providing quality education to the people.
He lauded the role of Higher Education Commission (HEC) saying that it played an excellent role in strengthening institutions of higher education in public as well as private sector.
He said that HEC has considerably widened the research base in these institutions in collaboration with industrial enterprises and reputable research organisations, adding that now universities in Pakistan conduct quality research.
In his welcome address, Vice Chancellor SUIT, Professor Salim-ur-Rehman highlighted salient features of the university. He said that the university started functioning in 2001 with only 68 students enrolled adding that the number of enrolled students stands at 1000 at present.
He said that university's current regular faculty strength is about 70 of which 13 professors are PhD degree holders. He said faculty-student ratio at Bachelors level is 19:1 which he said would be brought to 15:1 adding that the ratio at Masters level stands at 8:1. Earlier, The National Assembly Speaker gave away certificates and awards to the position holder distant students and congratulated them for excelling in the examinations.