Degrees conferred on 500 students at SMIU's 4th convocation
More than 500 students were conferred degrees at the fourth convocation of the Sindh Madressatul Islam University’s (SMIU) held on Wednesday at a private Banquet. Girl students clinched eight out of nine gold medals whereas an equal number of boys and girls received silver medals. Gold medalist included Moomal Baig, Usama, Iqra Abbas, Hadiqa Malik (all four students of the department of business administration), Fatima Rais (computer science department), Sania Iftikhar (department of media studies), Maira (department of environmental sciences) and Hira Naz (department of education). While silver medalist included Wardah Abdul Khalique, Wajiha Islam, Aiman Khalil, Bilal Anwar, Ayesha Kalhoro, Zain-ul-Abdeen, Mohammad Annas, Rafia Qadir, Indila Mazhar, Abdul Bari, Zohaib Muhabat Ali, Sumair Abdullah, Atiqa Iqbal, and Nimra Naz.
Speaking as the chief guest, Sindh Governor Imran Ismail, also the chancellor of all public-sector universities in the province said that he has been attending convocations since the last three years and has observed how female students generally take all top positions. He said that this is to be seen whether girls are more intelligent than boys or do they take studies seriously and then why girls don’t pursue their careers in practical life. “This has become a dilemma of our society that as soon as girls get done with their education, they’re married off,” he said, adding that doing so all the hard work of girls, their struggles, and gold medals go in vain.
The governor addressing the female students said that they should step out in the professional world and serve the nation as well. He said that students generally think that life after graduation is easy, “but let me tell your nothing is easy in life, you have to struggle.”
The governor said that the federal government initiated Kamyab Nojawan Programme in Pakistan under which the youth will get an Rs50 carror load. “The students should bring in their ideas and achieve their dreams,” he said.
Vice chancellor SMIU Prof. Dr. Mujeebuddin Sahrai Memon said that he felt highly content and pleased to congratulate his students and their proud parents for their presence in the wonderful convocation. “Indeed, it is a great pleasure to see my students clad in color gowns with smiles on their faces and fully prepared for take-off towards their bright career,” he said.
He said that all stakes of the university; those are faculty, officers, and supporting staff, need to have a strong chemistry to produce a wonderful graduate, to produce a groomed person, to produce a human being, and henceforth to produce a responsible global citizen. “It is this connection that I preached at 5th Asia-Europe Rectors’ Conference held at the Czech Republic in 2016 that in the 21st-century institutes shall receive the students as their customers and send-off them as quality products. I and my faculty are pretty confident today that the product which we are sending in the mainstream of this country and global stream of the world will serve with utmost responsibility, integrity, and honesty.”
The SMIU, he said, carries the legacy of 137 years with credit of producing visionary leadership, educationists, sports champions, rather I shall say icons of any field and top of everything the founder of Pakistan Quaid-e-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah. However, being a university, we are just nine years old starting with five programs, 129 students, and around 150 faculty and staff, he said adding that currently they are running 16 programs, having a student population of 4000 with 87 faulty of which 40% Ph.D. and 222 supporting staff. He said that they have established their recognition and space at the provincial, national, and international levels.
He shared how the Chancellor, Pro-Chancellor, and the faculty of the varsity have been able to hunt research and other projects worth Rs73 million. The projects like the establishment of High-Performance Computing Lab, National Incubation Center in collaboration with Punjab Information Technology Board (PITB), Incubation Center at SMIU are few to mention, he said.
Despite financial constraints he said, the university was able to manage appropriate funds for the construction of state-of-the-art Information Technology (I.T) Tower along with the new SMIU Model School building at the city campus. The I.T. Tower houses I.T related departments with highly sophisticated equipment and an Artificial Intelligence laboratory to meet the needs of the modern-day generation. Also, the SMIU Model School of the university currently houses 720 children from lower strata of the society and are currently receiving a quality education.
In addition to these facilities at its city campus, he said, the developmental work is going on with full swing on its 100-acres land in Education City, Malir District, Karachi with a federal-funded development project to the tune of Rs.1.57 billion. In order to promote green education and food security in the country, he announced that the university aims to open the Faculty of Horticulture and Natural Sciences and Faculty of Food Sciences at its Malir Campus.
Minister for Universities and Boards also pro chancellor of SMIU also congratulated the graduates and spoke on the occasion.