KARACHI, March 27: Pakistan has emerged as the only country across the globe having a digital library comprising 17,000 science journals with a vision to develop its human resources.

This was stated by Federal Minister and Higher Education Commission (HEC) Chairman Prof Dr Attaur Rehman on Sunday, while speaking at the foundation stone laying ceremony of Jamiat Delhi Siddiqui Community Housing Society at Gulshan-i-Maymar.

Dr Atta said the government was keen to groom the available human resources available around the country and make optimum use of the same.

According to him it was with the very motive that overseas Pakistani researchers and scientists were being persuaded and offered incentives to join higher education institutions back home and consequently 256 university level teachers had joined different postgraduate level institutions during the last two years.

Dr Atta reminded that current era was of strong economies and ironically Pakistan happened to be among the states where education was largely neglected during first 50 years of its inception.

He said that with a view to focus on science and technology, a prerequisite for economic growth, the government had attempted to strengthen the telecommunication department ultimately paving way for public accessibility to cell phones at extremely affordable rates.

Dr Atta said that the presence of satellites had further enhanced promotion of education.

Elaborating his stance, he said satellites had led to the inception of wide range of TV channels including two for exclusively educational purposes.

The HEC chairman informed that there was provision for more channels in the years to come and would prove beneficial for the country.

Dr Atta reiterating importance of qualified and trained manpower underscored need for promoting quality education at all levels and in all parts of the country.

According to him the government was making attempts to promote quality education with focus on proper training of teachers and scholarships for students unable to seek education due to economic constraints.

He lamented that the past governments did not make serious efforts in education sector which resulted in a class system of peculiar nature developed at the school and college levels.

Dr Atta maintained that besides strengthening the basic education and primary, secondary and intermediate level education programmes, scholarships were also being arranged for deserving students and scholars to seek registration in PhD level training programmes in countries like Netherlands, Australia, China, Germany and other.

He said a strategy had been evolved to train 1, 500 PhD students annually while another 15,000 to 20,000 students would be sent abroad for higher studies. —APP/PPI