Pride of the nation: Matric, intermediate toppers felicitated at ‘historic’ event

CM distributes Rs185 million in prizes among students


Our Correspondent January 15, 2016
The chief minister gives away a prize to a student. PHOTO: EXPRESS

LAHORE:


Education is the sole way of overcoming poverty, ignorance, unemployment and national progress, Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif said on Friday.


The chief minister made the remarks while addressing a ceremony at Aiwan-i-Iqbal where prizes worth Rs185million were distributed among students who had topped intermediate and matriculation examinations nationwide in 2015.  Sharif said cash prizes worth over Rs1 billion had been distributed among students who had topped examinations over the last eight years. He said over 100,000 gifted students from disadvantaged backgrounds were being given scholarships by the Punjab Educational Endowment Fund (PEEF). He said the number of scholarships would be raised to 200,000 over time.

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Terming the event a historic congregation, the chief minister said students from Sindh, Balochistan, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P), Gilgit Baltistan (G-B) and the federal capital territory were being felicitated before the nation at the ceremony. He said quality education was being provided to disadvantaged children by the Punjab Education Foundation (PEF). Sharif said labs had been established across public high schools to promote information technology. He said 400,000 laptops had been distributed among students.

The chief minister said the province’s erstwhile rulers had stashed Rs400 million in a “secret fund.” He said no one had any knowledge of what the money had been devoted to. Sharif said similar financial malpractice had taken place under bogey of development projects. The chief minister said a stringent accountability system was needed to recover the funds.

Sharif said the value of Pakistan’s total exports was smaller than that of Bangladesh’s textile exports. He said other states including India, Malaysia, Turkey, Jordan, Egypt and Sri Lanka were far ahead of Pakistan in the education sector.

The chief minister said the time was ripe to learn from past mistakes and work diligently for the nation. He said the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) had become a reality. The chief minister said the establishment of power generation projects under the CPEC would eliminate the energy shortfall.

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Sharif said the nation would have been counted among the ranks of developed states today had financial malpractice not taken place. He said development projects were being transparently completed. The chief minister said no stone would be left unturned to revamp the nation’s destiny and transform it into an Islamic welfare state. Sharif said every child from Karachi to Khyber had an inalienable right to quality education. The chief minister said no effort would be spared to ensure the provision of basic amenities including health and education to the people. Though this appeared to be a formidable task, the chief minister said, it was not undoable.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 16th, 2016.

COMMENTS (4)

Adnan Siddiqi | 8 years ago | Reply Why students from KPK are getting education in Punjab? Fan boys for long have been propagating that ever since PTI government has come into power, the education standards in KPK have reached another level of awe. Commendable step by CM Punjab to honor students in such grand style.
citizen26 | 8 years ago | Reply Good act, but whole education system needs to be reformed. How can a nation progress with multi educational systems? Reforming systems is imminent else distributing prizes wouldn't yield much and also this act of kindness would be considered injustice to rest of the students.
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