Radio professional remembered

By Abdul Qadir Qureshi
(Pakistan News & Features Services)

Tributes were paid to Syed Sibt-e-Asghar Bilgrami, a renowned radio professional and retired Deputy Controller of the Pakistan Broadcasting Corporation (PBC), who passed away recently 

His colleagues recalled the memories of late Bilgrami at a condolence meeting held at the Old Broadcasting House of Radio Pakistan at M A Jinnah Road, Karachi. 

The 71-year old Bilgrami had passed away after a protracted illness leaving behind a widow a son and a daughter to mourn his death. 

The meeting participants offered fateha and prayed to Allah to rest the departed soul in eternal peace.

SSUET student gets USAID Fulbright Scholarship

By Abdul Qadir Qureshi
(Pakistan News & Features Services)

Syed Mustafa Jamal, a student of the Sir Syed University of Engineering & Technology (SSUET), Karachi, has been awarded the prestigious Fulbright scholarship. 

The SSUET Chancellor, Jawaid Anwar, has appreciated Mustafa Jamal for this great achievement and wished him greater success in his future career.. 

With BS degree in Biomedical Engineering from Sir Syed University, Mustafa Jamal was selected from among 1700 candidates for the scholarship and is set to leave for US for higher education, according to a statement issued recently. 

Funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), Fulbright scholarship covers tuition, required textbooks, air fare and health insurance.

SSUET plans to launch new courses

By Abdul Qadir Qureshi
(Pakistan News & Features Services)

The Sir Syed University of Engineering and Technology has chalked out plans to introduce new courses. "In order to meet the present day demands, the university will introduce new courses and technologies including BBA, MBA and Management courses for engineers,” the SSUET Chancellor, Jawaid Anwar, announced during a recent meeting. 

He said that the university, as per its charter, had the authority to launch new courses and technologies. The SSUET was the first in Pakistan to introduce the discipline of Bio-medical Engineering while four new technologies in Software Engineering, Bioinformatics, Architecture and Electrical Engineering were added to existing courses in Computer, Civil, Telecommunication, Bio-Medical Electronics engineering besides Computer Science. 

He pointed out that a large number of graduates were benefitting from short certificate courses like Project Management Professionals, Web Engineering, PHP MySQL, Graphic Designing and Web Designing already being run by Continuing Education Programme of the Sir Syed University. 

Speaking about admission policy, Chancellor Jawaid Anwar said that the admission process was passing through the last phase. The merit list was issued as per schedule and the admissions were successfully done on pure merit through a transparent procedure. 

He added that the admission process will be completed as per schedule on January 8, 2016, after which new the academic session will get underway. 

The Chancellor recalled that January 8 was a day of great significance in the history of South Asia as it was on this day that Mohammadan Anglo Oriental (MAO) College was founded in Aligarh by Sir Syed Ahmed Khan that set the direction of Muslims of subcontinent towards scientific education. 

"Being the true followers of Sir Syed Ahmed Khan's ideology, we established SSUET and Aligarh Institute of Technology to carry forward the mission of great educationist and reformer to promote modern education,” Chancellor Jawaid Anwar stated.

Police to provide foolproof security to polio workers

By Abdul Qadir Qureshi
(Pakistan News & Features Services)

The Inspector General Police, Sindh, Ghulam Hyder Jamali, has issued directives for providing due security to polio drops administering teams during the anti-polio drive starting from December 9 to 17.

He directed that East, West and South Zones be divided into sectors and sub-sectors with extra ordinary security measures to be provided under the supervision of concerned SSPs for polio teams. 

He instructed that deployment of police commandos with polio teams be ensured in categorized sensitive Union Councils/Areas.

A report compiled by the police said that overall 4325 police commandos/personnel drawn from will perform security cover to the SSU, Rapid Response Force, Sindh Reserve Police, Counter Terrorism Department, Sindh Crime Branch, Anti-Encroachment Cell, Shaheed Benazirabad Elite PoliceTraining School Razaqabad, and Police Training College Saeedabad/RTC Hyderabad, Jam Nawaz and PTC Shahdadpur besides existing force from Zones, Districts and Police Stations. 

This has been done to provide foolproof security to health workers, doctors and other staff as part of polio teams, particularly in areas of sensitive union councils. These teams will administer polio drops in various parts of union councils of Karachi in coordination with stake holders.

The IGP directed that during this period, there should be effective mobile movement of police on motor cycles besides snap and random checking at different points with strict vigil at entry and exit points along with intelligence.

Police intensifies action against crime

By Abdul Qadir Qureshi

(Pakistan News & Features Services)

According to a report submitted to the Inspector General Police, Sindh, Ghulam Hyder Jamali, as many as 1357 terrorists/criminals were killed in police action during 823 days of Karachi Operation. 

The report added 73,072 culprits were arrested during this period since September 5, 2013. It also said that during this period police had 4,143 encounters with the criminals/terrorists and busted 2117 organized gangs. 

During the period under review, police claimed to have recovered 1437 kilograms of explosive material, 31 suicide jackets, 15 IEDs, 1808 bombs/hand grenades, 20 LMGs, 438 SMGs/KK, 289 shotguns/repeaters, 348 rifles and 16910 pistols/revolvers/mouzers.

SANA condemns killing in San Bernardino

By Abdul Qadir Qureshi
(Pakistan News & Features Services)

The Sindhi Association of North America (SANA) has expressed deep sorrow and grief over the killing of innocent people in San Bernardino, California, and demanded of the Government of the United States for gun control laws to abstain such type of incidents causing loss of precious lives.

The SANA’s Central President, Jamil Daudi, General Secretary, Noorunissa Ghanghro, and other members of Executive Council also condemned the massacre. 

The SANA Executive Council, in a statement, said that every other day mass shooting incidents in the United States were causing distress, unrest and terror among the citizens, and now time is up to come up with some concrete measures to control these incidents and save precious human lives.  

The SANA leaders, expressing deep sorrow and sympathy with the families of victims, said that although the killer couple seemed to be Muslims but relating the incident with religion will be unjustified. 

“The SANA and Sindhi community of North America, affirms at large to work for peace and harmony at all level to extend a safe and secure atmosphere to our young generations, and demands from the Government of United States for measures to prevent such mass killings at the hands of cruel people” the statement concluded.

Ombudsman rescues medical student

By Abdul Qadir Qureshi
(Pakistan News & Features Services)

The intervention by the Provincial Ombudsman Asad Ashraf Malik, helped a female student to get back about half a million rupees which she had deposited in a public sector medical university as admission fee.

The student, Asra Zafar had deposited Rs 441,600 in a public sector university as admission fee but later she changed her mind and got admission in another university and sought the refund of the deposited a mount which, however, was declined by the university. 

She approached the Provincial Ombudsman with whose efforts, the university paid back the deposited amount and handed a cheque for Rs 441,600 to Ombudsman. 

The Ombudsman Asad Ashraf Malik handed the cheque to the complainant student in his office.

PNSC considers greater employment opportunities to PMA cadets

By Abdul Qadir Qureshi
(Pakistan News & Features Services)

The Pakistan National Shipping Corporation (PNSC), with the collaboration of the Pakistan Marine Academy (PMA), is considering providing more employment opportunities to the PMA cadets.

In this connection a high level joint meeting of both the organizations was held with the senior officials in attendance. Arif Elahi, Chairman, PNSC, and Commodore Syed Akber Naqi, Commandant, PMA, headed their respective delegations. 

The meeting constituted a three-member committee headed by Brig Rashid Siddiqui and comprising of Zaheer Baber and the Commandant, Marine Academy, as its members. 

The committee has been assigned to the task of developing a new recruitment system for the PMA cadets, with the cooperation of DG Ports and Shipping. 

The meeting decided that a conference of private marine training institutes and the heads of Merchant Navy organizations will soon be convened. 

It was also suggested that the private shipping companies be persuaded to provide employment to the PMA cadets, the number of cadets who sign on and sign off on the PNSC ships be raised from 18 to 30. These cadets may also be provided employment at harbor crafts and harbor rovers. 

It was  decided that during training these cadets will be paid scholarship (stipend) sponsored by the PNSC. The committee considered awarding scholarship of Rs one lac per head to the five position holder cadets of the PMA. The PNSC has offered financial assistance for upgrading physics and chemistry labs of the PMA.

It was also decided that only those institutions having ample experience of shipping would be allowed to impart training so that the practice of awarding certificate without any training is to discourage and brought to end. A committee comprising of the PNSC shipping experts would redesign the syllabus. 

The PNSC Chairman emphasized that the regulatory authority be reactivated particularly in the matters concerning the PMA. He also stated that he will get this matter investigated as to why the PMA cadets were not getting employment on foreign vessels. 

The participants of the meeting included PNSC’s Director Administration, Brig Rashid Siddiqui, Director, Ship Management, Zaheer Baber Qureshi, PNSC’ Manager Training, Commodore, Muhammad Aslam Rana and Hafiz Amin Nizami, the President gold medalist of the PMA.

Raeesuddin Paracha appointed Federal Insurance Ombudsman

By Abdul Qadir Qureshi
(Pakistan News & Features Services)

Mohammad Raeesuddin Paracha, a Grade 22 officer of the Federal Government, has been appointed as Federal Insurance Ombudsman at its headquarters in Karachi.

He was administered oath of office for a four-year term by the President of Pakistan, Mamnoon Hussain, at an impressive ceremony held in Islamabad recently which was attended by Senior Government Officials and dignitaries. 

Raeesuddin Paracha has a vast service experience in various government positions at the federal and provincial levels. 

Revered as a highly professional officer, he has served in the Ministry of Law, Justice & Human Rights as well as in the Ministry of Textile Industries, besides having worked as Executive Director State Life Insurance Corporation. He has also served as Deputy Commissioner, Commissioner and Secretary to the Government of Sindh in different departments. 

He had received a Master’s Degree in Statistics from the University of Karachi in the year 1979 and subsequently he cleared the competitive examination in the year 1982.

He successfully participated in the training course in Public Administration organized by National Institute of Public Administration in 2003 and the National Management Course offered by National Management Collage, Lahore in 2010. 

He was also certified by the Executive Development Institute, National School of Public Policy, Lahore, upon the completion of the Executive Programme on Improving Government Performance in 2011.

SSUET VC condoles Jamiluddin Aali’s death

By Abdul Qadir Qureshi
(Pakistan News & Features Services)

The Vice Chancellor of the Sir Syed University of Engineering & Technology (SSUET), Karachi, Prof Dr Syed Jawaid H Rizvi, has expressed deep grief and sorrow over the sad demise of noted writer, poet and literary figure, Jamiluddin Aali.

In a condolence message, Dr Rizvi recalled the monumental services of Jamiluddin Aali and observed that his death has created a big vacuum in the literary circles of the country which will be difficult to fill. 

Jamiluddin Aali was the recipient of three awards from the Government of Pakistan, President’s Pride of Performance Gold Medal in 1992; Hilal-i-Imtiaz (Urdu Literature) in 2003, and Kamal-i-Funn Award. 

He remained the chairman of the Urdu Dictionary Board for three years. Besides dohas, Jamiluddin Aali was revered for ghazals, poems, lyrical ballads and geets. 

His immortal patriotic songs included 'jeevay jeevay Pakistan', 'aye watan kay sajeelay jawano', 'mera pegham Pakistan', 'hum ta ba abad saee-o-taghayyur kay wali hein' and 'itnay baray jeevan sagar main'. 

The Vice-Chancellor offered his heartfelt condolences to the bereaved family and prayed to Allah to rest the departed in eternal peace.