Allama iqbal open university Matric, Phd admissions

AIOU announces schedule for admission forms
Islamabad, March 19: The Allama Iqbal Open University (AIOU) will receive admission forms for spring semester from matric to PhD level till Saturday.

A press release issued by the university on Thursday said the date for submission of forms will not be extended. The university has announced admissions to BBA/BA/BCom, intermediate and Al-Lisan-ul-Arabi programmes across the country and in Middle East.

Admission forms and prospectus for all programmes are available at the main campus of the university in Sector H-8, Islamabad and its 36 regional campuses/offices and 116 coordinating offices across the country. APP

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Teachers' seniority lists being updated
Rawalpindi: Punjab higher education department has started updating and verifying the existing seniority lists of college teachers to initiate the long-awaited process of promotions, it has been learnt.

An official seeking anonymity said that the department through respective divisional directors for colleges had sought the present strength of their teaching and non-teaching staff to upgrade the seniority lists that have not been renewed since long.

In the absence of these lists, the college teachers have been waiting for their promotions for as many as 25 years and serving in the same grade they were inducted at the time of appointment.

According to the official, the existing lists are flawed as names of many teachers remain there, despite the fact they opted out of the job or passed away during the service.

The department has regularly been updating the lists with including the new names, but never verified whether teachers existed or not making it difficult for the college teachers to get promotions.

When contacted, Director Colleges Rawalpindi division, Dr Muhammad Ashraf, confirmed that the department had initiated the process of updating and verifying the existing seniority lists of the teachers. Dawn

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Mural Painting Activity
Islamabad: A 'Peace Mural', which was started in Japan, has been completed by Pakistani students as part of a students exchange programme titled 'Mural Painting Activity & Video Conferencing' organised by the Funkor Child Art Centre.

The healthy activity was organised among high school students of Okazaki Johsei High School in Japan and students of the Beaconhouse School System, Banigala, Islamabad, in Pakistan.

Half of the mural was made in Japan while the Pakistani students completed the other half. The students met via a video conferencing when the Pakistan group was just on their way to paint the mural.

The Japanese students had painted a telescope to represent Japan's advancement in science and technology, but simple symbols were also used like a carrot that is good for health, a dog that is treated like a family member in Japan, and textbooks that are a source of knowledge for Japanese students.

On the other hand, the students here painted Pakistani youth representing the four provinces, a hand reaching out for peace decorated with henna, while mangoes, kinos, blind dolphins and jasmine flowers were painted as symbols of the beauty of Pakistani culture. They used block prints to decorate their painting and wrote 'peace' in Japanese and Urdu.

Natsumi, Marika, Masatishi, Yumi and Yuri accompanied by their teachers Takemasa, Mamoru and Ryo completed their side of the mural in Japan while those who showed their artistic talents here in Pakistan included Abdaal Ahmad Bukhari, Xayneb Ali, Mishaal Khawaja, Noormah Jamal, Babar Jaan, Saman Fatima, Waqarunnissa Sarfaraz, Minile Khan, Fizza Abbas, Marziyeh Ozark and Aliyeh Ozark accompanied by their teacher Neelum Shezz.

The Pakistani students also interacted with Atsuko Shiwaku, founder of Japan Art Mile International Intercultural Mural Exchange.

The video conferencing was a great success as well as the completion of the mural, which was beautifully summed up by Aliyeh and Marziyeh Ozark, terming it an excellent opportunity to build bridges across cultures, borders and stereotypes. They said the Japanese and Pakistani student exchange programme was a wonderful experience that let them express their creative side and reflect upon how to create peace.

The students of both sides shared laughter, exchanged information about each other, and explored the technological marvels of Japan besides inquiring about the cultural heritage of both the countries. The Pakistani students learnt the Japanese word for peace, 'Hiewa', while the Japanese students learnt the Urdu word 'Aman' and wanted to know what it is called in Pushto, too.

The mural will be part of the 'Exhibition of the Century' to be organised by the Art Miles Mural Project (AMMP) in Egypt in 2010. The AMMP plans to construct a pyramid of murals next to the magnificent ancient pyramids in Egypt. The news

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Teacher kills leopard
Muzaffarabad: A schoolteacher in Kotli district of Azad Kashmir has been alleged to have shot dead a leopard of a 'near threatened' species and handed over its pelt to a minister from the area.

The accused - Mohammad Arshad - confessed to killing the leopard, zoologically known as Panthera Pardus, with a 12-bore rifle after the local wildlife department personnel verified before dozens of villagers the occurrence of illegal hunting, Javaid Ayub, director wildlife and fisheries department said.

He said the accused had removed the animal to his home in Mohri Syeddan village after killing it in a forest located in Tehsil Sehnsa on March 16.

However, when the accused was told that he would have to pay a fine of Rs200,000, return the pelt and submit an undertaking, Mr Arshad claimed that he had given the pelt to Local Government and Rural Development Minister Raja Naseer Ahmed Khan.

This correspondent left separate messages with Mr Khan's private secretary and gunman for his viewpoint, but did not receive any call from the minister.

Mr Ayub said his department was preparing a case for a forest magistrate to take punitive action against the accused under the Wildlife Act 1975.

Under the prevailing law, illegal hunters are liable to fines, equivalent to market price of the animal they kill, and imprisonment of at least six months.

However, Mr Ayub pointed out that non-promulgation of the amended Wildlife Act 2010 was causing recurrence of such incidents as it hindered stringent action against the hunters.

Meanwhile, another leopard died in Pir Lasura National Park in Kotli on Thursday.

Confirming the death, Mr Ayub said his staff had sent the specimen of the animal's gut to wildlife laboratory in Lahore to determine the cause of death. Dawn

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Pashto-Urdu poetic collection
Peshawar: The first poetry collection of young writer Haroon Khan Shinwari has hit the stalls. The book titled "Zama Latoon Zama Janoon" is a combination of Pashto and Urdu poetry and third venture of the author in the field of writing since 1995.

Born in Landikotal town of Khyber Agency to a family of businessmen headed by Haji Akbar Ali and doing masters in International Relations and Pashto literature from the University of Peshawar, Haroon Shinwari started writing poetry after getting impressed with legendary Amir Hamza Khan Shinwari, known as Baba-e-Pashto Ghazal.

He wrote the first prose book in English, An Introduction to Hamza Baba. His second contribution was Urdu translation of a book 'The plain tales of Afghan border' written by Sir Edward Bown in 1980 in London.

In the preface to his new 154-page book, the noted writer, poet and broadcaster Laiq Zada Laiq called Haroon Shinwari the real fan and follower of Hamza Baba and said his poetic pieces are the manifestation of this fact. He termed Haroon Shinwari's Pashto and Urdu poetry as an important contribution towards the literature in the two languages.

In his comments on the book, Dr Masood Zahid lauded Haroon Shinwari's poetry as the beats of a sensitive heart. "Going through the book one can easily understand how deep the thoughts of the young but energetic author are," he wrote.

"Haroon has proved his commitment to the service of his mother tongue by producing a quality book despite being busy in performing his duty at a semi-government project and fulfilling many other tasks at a time," he added. The news

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