SARGODHA, Nov 22: Punjab Governor Khalid Maqbool on Friday inaugurated the newly-chartered University of Sargodha in the Government College.

He also announced an annual grant of Rs100 million for the next three years besides providing two buses for transport facilities to university students.

Also the chancellor of the University of Sargodha, the governor said the University would start functioning this year in the local Government College.

Speaking on the occasion, the governor underlined the need of quality education with research and publication work.

Highlighting the objectives of the newly established university, he said students should make research on socio-economic problems and suggest ways for its solution. The aim of the university should not be to obtain degrees and search for jobs.

For the rapid progress, he said the university should arrange new faculties, including agro industry, management sciences, food research, processing and packing and information technology.

During the last three years the Punjab government had given incentives for doing PhD and liberal scholarships to talented and deserving students, he said.

The governor said efforts should be continued for looking up the standard of teachers, laboratories and libraries. It is binding upon the government to provide affordable quality-based education to students.

Khalid Maqbool announced that the Government College would not run on commercial basis. The teaching staff in government educational institutions should work devoutedly so that students could not think about private institutions.

The governor lauded Chaudhry Muhammad Ali (Bhalwal) and Mian Muhammad Anwar (Sargodha) for donating Rs10 million and Rs100,000, respectively, for the university.

District Nazim Malik Amjad Ali Noon, Punjab Education Secretary Chaudhry Sibtain Fazal, District Coordination Officer Hassan Iqbal, prominent educationists, teaching staff and students of local colleges were also present on the occasion.

Distributing cheques of loans among industrialists later in the local Jinnah Hall, the governor said Rs1.2 billion had been allocated for the uplift of the Punjab industrial estates.

He said the Punjab Industrial State Department would charge only 7 per cent mark-up from those industrialists who were actively contributing to the development of industry in Sargodha, Mianwali, Khushab and Bhakkar districts. For this purpose, Rs200 million had been allocated for Sargodha, he said.

The process of distributing residential plots in rural areas was in progress and around 100,000 plots would be distributed among the shelterless, he said.

The governor said that 60,000 young men were recruited strictly on merit in different departments, including police, health, education and revenue.

The autonomy was given to the State Bank and other financial institutions to weed out corruption and undue favouritism as, he alleged, the rulers in the past had extorted billions of rupees.