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Over 400 need-based scholarships okayed
ISLAMABAD, Sept 2: The National Scholarship Management Committee (NSMC)
of the Higher Education Commission (HEC) on Saturday approved the cases of 487
candidates from 26 different universities for the award of Rs1.1 billion
"need-based scholarships (NBS)", under Japanese and US programmes.
The
meeting was presided over by executive director of the HEC Prof Dr Sohail Naqvi,
says a press release.
Dr Naqvi briefed the participants that the HEC had
initiated the scholarship programmes, which would benefit more than 2,800
families for pursuing undergraduate and graduate academic programmes at various
public and private institutions.
At present, he said, three such
programmes were in operation for the last two years in which more than 1,500
families were benefiting. The disciplines covered in these programmes are
agriculture, business administration, biotechnology, engineering, information
technology and telecommunication, natural sciences, social sciences, genetics,
pharmacy and life sciences.
Dr Naqvi informed the participants that at
present 50 leading public and private institutions were participating in this
HEC initiative. He said the HEC intended to spread this network of scholarship
and develop a sustainable methodology to include all the universities and
institutions of higher education in Pakistan in this scheme.
He said it
was the right time that the participating institutions must aggressively take up
the pivotal assignment to make the programme accessible to the students in
backward and rural areas who could not afford to attain higher education despite
possessing the intelligence. Similarly, he said, the institutions were required
to initiate activities to generate funds for continuity of the
programme.
Abeera Sherafgan, the representative of USAID, informed the
committee members regarding the US government's preferences to increase the
ratio of female enrolments in the participating institutions.
Suleman
Abdiah, the representative of the Japanese government, said Japan had given
special consideration for promotion of higher education in Pakistan by approving
this multi million scholarship project.
He said the Japanese government
was keen to fund more students from the under-privileged areas of Pakistan,
specifically Fata. Dawn
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