ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Imran Khan launched an online portal to register complaints pertaining to educational scholarships, something he believed would ensure meritocracy and transparency, and uplift the students through ambition and drive.
Linked with the Pakistan Citizen Portal, the facility would help the scholarship holders to register their complaints and ensure the judicious use of the allocated resources.
At present, the government is spending Rs28 billion to support the education of deserving and competent students. The beneficiaries include around 2.6 million students, 72 percent of them women.
Khan said that a team of academics would oversee the portal and guide the government to grant scholarships in particular fields keeping in view the demands of the market as well as the country.
He said the government had long been receiving complaints from the students for being neglected or delayed in the payment of scholarships which prompted him to introduce a technology-based centralised system for verification and criteria setting of scholarships.
“Through scholarships, we can decide the future course of the nation’s development. The purpose of the education system should be nation-building. The subjects (being taught) should have a connection with the nation-building […] Considering the technology revolution, we ought to direct our youth to the technology,” he remarked.
The prime minister said the government also launched a Rehmatul-lil-Aalameen scholarship with a view to acquaint the youth with the leadership qualities of Prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H.) and principles of the model of the state of Medina which produced great leaders.
He said any state following those principles would excel and emerge as a welfare state.
He said it was government as well as the society’s responsibility to guide the youth towards technology and humanity besides uplifting the people with more hunger and drive.
Prime Minister Khan said the portal would also help save the precious time of the students and make them focus on their education who otherwise had to go from pillar to post to register their scholarship-related complaints.
The prime minister also congratulated the team of the Prime Minister’s Performance Delivery Unit (PMDU) for putting in efforts to set up the apparatus and the National University of Science and Technology (NUST) for improving the education standards in Pakistan.
Minister for Education Shafqat Mahmood said the government enhanced the number of scholarships under the prime minister’s vision of enabling disadvantaged students.
He said since 2018, the government gave away record scholarships to support the future generations.
Mahmood said giving priority to higher education, the government allocated Rs123 billion for it, including Rs42 billion for new schemes.
Moreover, 28 new universities have been established during the last three years, he recalled.
