PESHAWAR, Nov 22: The NWFP Governor, Syed Iftikhar Hussain Shah, has urged the people from every field to switch over to Information Technology.

He added that three new universities have been established in the province in two years for the promotion of technical education in the province.

Speaking at the launching ceremony of Web portal www.greatpakistan.com under the auspices of a Peshawar-based IT concern of youths in a local hotel on Friday morning, the governor said the newly-established university at Kohat was focusing on IT.

It’s two other sister institutions, Hazara University at Dhodiyal in district Mansehra and Malakand University at Chakdara in district Lower Dir focus on Micro-biology and Bio-technology respectively.

In fact, he said, we have been lagging behind in every field, therefore, concerted efforts were needed to bridge the gape.

The governor also mentioned the locational disadvantage of the province and said, due to being far from the seaport, investments in the industrial sector were not encouraging.

He added, the promotion of employment-oriented education, especially in this most modern field, was a must to find a solution to economic backwardness.

In this way, he remarked, the youths could be self-employed and they would have an open field before them. This, he added, was the only way to counter the geographical disadvantage.

Stressing the need for IT the governor said: “IT has become an effective and powerful tool and its scope is unlimited.”

Congratulating the management of Silk Soft for launching the Web Portal, the governor said, it was the second ceremony of the same nature, he had attended in 10 days, and said these could only be proved worthwhile if data was updated on regular basis.

Earlier, Asif Khan, head of the Web Portal while welcoming the governor said: “We have stepped into this field to bring a change in the outlook of this area and society.”

In fact, he said, the 600-billion international market was overshadowed by foreign technology.

He wished to work for an e-government and hoped to get cooperation from respective government institutions.

Obaidur Rehman of Iqra University also spoke on the occasion and highlighted the role of these institutions in the promotion of IT education in the province.

He claimed that graduates of this university were being excepted for various competitive exams.

Ahsan of Silk Soft gave a demonstration of the Portal.