Moalims

Thousands of LUMS graduates are working in Pakistan and abroad. They were lucky to have had access to a superior university education thanks to the vision, drive and efforts of Syed Babar Ali. He was able to convince fellow business men and industrialists to contribute and help set-up LUMS. All of should be commended for providing quality education in Pakistan. I would like to suggest that their example should be taken up by more businessmen and industrialists to help set up some polytechnic institutes in their region to help millions of children who need jobs. Industrialists from main Punjab cities could set up institutes for the kind of labour they need. These polytechnic institutes would directly benefit the industries, owned by the businessmen by providing trained manpower. They would help the children from lower middle-class families to learn a trade, as the cost of a university education is beyond the reach of most. Some of these diploma holders would end up in foreign countries earning badly needed foreign exchange. As most of Europe and other developed countries, due to a steady decline in population, are facing shortage of trained manpower, many would find employment and being qualified they could get better pay.
The provincial governments could contribute by providing free of cost land, duty free import of training aids and fast track approval of electricity and gas connections so that these polytechnic institutes are made operational in the shortest possible time. The provincial governments need to keep in mind that only those areas would attract new industries where trained manpower is readily available.