15 January 2004	Thursday	22 Ziqa'ad 1424

LAHORE, Jan 14: The Punjab government's plan to set up an information technology university is in the doldrums following the withdrawal of offer by the science and technology ministry to hand over its COMSATS Institute of Information Technology (CIIT) to the province.

Punjab Chief Minister Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi has also written a letter to the prime minister, requesting him to ask the ministry to review its latest decision and honour its commitment. The government has, however, yet to receive any response.

Federal Science and Technology Minister Prof Dr Ataur Rahman had offered in Nov 2002 to the Punjab government to take over administrative control of the CIIT campus on the Raiwind Road to covert it into an IT University.

Thereafter, a hectic exercise started at the provincial level when the education and the IT departments locked horns to implement and execute the project.

The education department, considering that the IT department deals with implementation of IT policy and action plan in the province and not with colleges and university education, had also deputed its additional secretary (academic) to work out modalities for the take over of the CIIT.

The additional secretary held two meetings and worked out plan for the take-over and processing of the IT University through provincial legislation. In the meantime, the case of the education and IT departments was examined at chief secretary and chief minister's level. The meetings finally decided in July last year that the IT department would be made administrative department of the proposed university as soon as the government would take over the institute.

Showing its commitment, the Punjab government also allocated Rs15 million for the IT University and reflected it in the ADP of the current financial year. However, when the IT department officials approached the CIIT Rector, they were informed that the institute's board of governors, chaired by the federal science and technology minister, had decided to withdraw the offer and instead contacted the Punjab government to purchase the building.

It is pertinent to mention that the federal government had established CIIT in Lahore in collaboration with the Punjab government. The Punjab government had leased out the newly-constructed building, on a piece of 185 acres, owned by the Workers' Welfare Board, labour and human resource department, to the science and technology ministry on a nominal rent of Rs250,000 a month.

It is reliably learnt that the chief minister had informed the prime minister that the government was committed to promoting IT education and the establishment of provincial IT University would help focus on high standards of learning and promotion of IT research and development.