The list includes harmless words such as ‘Jesus Christ’ besides the words generally considered inappropriate by the society. Imagine if ‘Muhammad’ was to be included in the list of banned words by a western country?

Telecom providers are carriers of information or bits, similar to a postal carrier. When one sends a letter using a postal carrier such as Pakistan Post, one is free to choose any words to express. Pakistan Post does not place any restriction on the contents of the letter.

There are legitimate concerns of spam text messages and sending inappropriate text messages to children. However, the former problem can potentially be solved using a ‘Do not receive message from a number not in contact’ mechanism. The later problem can be addressed by limiting the use of text messages for under age children when purchasing the phone plan.

The most worrisome aspect of this ban a small number of people at PTA determine the list of inappropriate words and can arbitrary expand this list.

PTAs concerns about the use of inappropriate words are understandable. However, it is worth considering whether these concerns should be addressed via top down ban of words in SMS, or by educating and raising awareness among youth through educational campaigns in partnership with schools, colleges, and universities.

We invite our readers to discuss whether such a ban should be instituted by PTA.

Umar Saif,

“The TR35 recognizes the world’s top 35 young innovators that are radically transforming technology as we know it. Their work – spanning medicine, computing, communications, energy, electronics and nanotechnology — is changing our world”, according to MIT Technology Review.

According to a LUMS press release today, this is the first time that a Pakistani has been selected in the TR35 list.

Dr. Umar Saif joins an elite group of researchers and entrepreneurs selected over the last decade. Previous winners include Larry Page and Sergey Brin, the co-founders of Google; Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook; Jonathan Ive, the chief designer at Apple; David Karp, founder of Tumbler; Harvard Professor Alán Aspuru-Guzik for his work on Quantum computers; and MIT Neuroscientist Ed Boyden, one of the inventors of the emerging field of optogenetics, which makes it possible to control neurons with light.

Dr. Saif joined LUMS after completing a post doctorate at MIT where he was part of the group that developed technologies for project Oxygen. At LUMS, his research is focused on technology for developing regions. He has recently developed BitMate, a BitTorrent client for improving download speeds in regions with poor Internet connectivity. The client was been downloaded more than 30,000 times by people in 173 countries.

Dr. Saif is also a co-founder of several startups at his Saif Center for Innovation. The startups include SeenReport, BumpIn, and SMSall. Talking to STEP earlier, he offered his vision of Saif Center in a previous interview here. He has received numerous awards for his work, including the Mark Weiser award, Microsoft Research award, and IDG CIO Technology pioneer award. He was also named as a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum in 2010.

Congratulations Umar!

The regulation came into effect on July 10, 2010 and overrides an earlier regulation promulgated on November 13, 2008, titled “Monitoring and Reconciliation of International Traffic Regulations, 2008″. Our reading of the 2010 regulations indicate that they allow the Pakistani Telecommunication Authority (PTA) to monitor and block any traffic (encrypted or not), including voice and data, originating or terminating in Pakistan. Further, through these regulations, PTA is banning the use of encryption for signaling information. In case, the user of a telephony or data provider needs to encrypt its signaling information, it must obtain explicit permission from PTA. Below, we quote verbatim from page 549 of the Gazette of Pakistan, that describes this regulation:

“(6) The Licensee(s) and Access Provider shall ensure that signaling information is uncompressed, unencrypted, and not formatted in a manner which the installed monitoring system is unable to decipher using installed capabilities.

(7) In case it is not possible to monitor the signaling information of some traffic at the Probe and the Authority has agreed to let the traffic pass through, the required signaling information shall be extended from the Licensee(s) and Access Provider(s) network’s premises, at their own cost, including but not limited to the required format conversions, hauling of data to the Authority designated location, and installation of additional equipment to achieve information as specified in sub regulation (6) above.”

So what is signaling information? A signaling information identifies who is calling or exchanging data with whom. For example, if a user A of cell phone provider 1 calls user B of cell phone provider 2, a CDR (call data record) is created in the database records of both providers. Similar records can be created for data (IP) traffic. The promulgated regulation practically bans the use of encrypted virtual private networks (EVPNs) by IT businesses unless an explicit permission is maintained by PTA. In simple terms, any IT business in Pakistan which wants to use EVPNs must obtain an explicit permission from PTA. According to a PTA memo date July 21, 2011 posted on this blog, PTA is enforcing this regulation by sending warnings to ISPs. However, does PTA have the man power to vet the legality of every EVPN?

Are there any other software besides EVPNs that encrypt signaling information? The answer is clearly yes. Skype is an example of a popular software which encrypts its signaling information for establishing a voice or video call. If PTA’s regulation were to be strictly enforced, it will ban the use of Skype in Pakistan.

Besides restricting signaling information from being encrypted, the regulation forces the providers of voice and data traffic to procure, establish, deploy, and maintain equipment for a monitoring system at their own costs. Below is the excerpt from the regulation:

1. Capability to monitor, control, measure, and record traffic in real-time
2. Capability for complete signaling record, including but not limited for billing
3. Capability to accurately measure the quality of service
4. A complete list of Pakistani customers and their details
5. Complete details of capacity leased by the licensee(s) to their customers
6. No person, except the authority shall be allowed to monitor, reconcile or block any traffic directly or indirectly on their own network or that of the other network in the manner prescribed in these regulations, without prior written approval of the Authority.

We note that (1) and (2) are not necessarily specific to Pakistan. Many  countries have regulations in place which allow the competent authority to monitor the signaling record or intercept traffic. However, such snooping of traffic is usually accompanied by a court order. Therefore, the most worrisome part from the perspective of a Pakistani citizen is (6) which gives PTA the authority to monitor and block traffic. It is not clear whether PTA needs a court order to exercise this authority.

Has your online business being impacted by this law in any way? We invite you to post your experiences as comments.

Created in the Fall 2000 as a group of just a few to help the needy students of Topi, Project Topi now comprises of more than fifty volunteer members. In the past ten years, Project Topi has expanded itself from a helper of the people of Topi to one of the larger student-run welfare societies in Pakistani universities. We have worked on several projects at the provincial and national level, thus extending our horizons beyond Topi.

Project Topi organizes several events throughout the academic year. Despite other activities of the organization, our main focus remains on helping the students of Topi village. We host a call for volunteers every year, and those who volunteer give an hour of  free tutoring to the students in Topi schools, including the Topi High School, Hamlet High School and GIKI School. Several deserving students are also given financial aids and scholarships each year to help them complete their education.

As is the case with the most of the underdeveloped villages in Pakistan, Topi also has inadequate health care facilities. A majority of the villagers are financially weak and cannot afford even basic life saving drugs and treatments.  Project Topi has been actively participating in providing health care to the people in the region by organizing Blood Donation Camps and Free Medical Camps in collaboration with reputed NGOs, such as Jamila Sultana Foundation, Pakistan Red Crescent Society, Fatimid Foundation, and Al-Khidmat Foundation. On several occasions, Project Topic has also raised funds to help pay medical bills for workers and staff members of the Institute and their families.

Project Topi has worked tirelessly during nationwide disasters, such as the Earth Quake of October 2005, the thought of which still makes us shiver, and the massive outflow of Internally Displaced People of Swat. Last year when the unfortunate floods swept through the country causing catastrophic loss of property and life, Project Topi stood up to the challenge despite meager resources at its disposal. With the help of Drs. Tariq Saeed and Siraj ul Haq, faculty members at the GIK Institute, several relief camps were organized in the affected areas. To raise funds for these camps, members of Project Topi team went door to door to students, faculty members, and alumni of GIKI, and their own families and friends. Within a few weeks, we raised around 1 million Rupees. With these funds, and other donations received by Project Topi in the form of clothes, cash, medicine, food and stationary items, the organization started relief work in Charsadda district of Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa. Food items such as flour, oil, sugar, tea, and clean drinking water were provided to over two hundred families living in the relief camps around Charsadda.  In addition, around one thousand school bags with stationary items and books were distributed among the children of the area so they could resume their academic activities. A medical camp was also organized with the help of GIKI’s medical team at a village near Charsadda. Sewn clothes, small gifts and little cash envelopes were also distributed among several families as eidi on the occasion of Eid.

Believing in the principle of teaching people how to catch fish rather than just providing it, following the devastating floods, Project Topi helped several small businessmen, shopkeepers and other daily-wagers to resume their business activities and start supporting their families again. A group comprising of electricians, a taxi driver, a milkman, a crockery store owner, and a fruit-seller was among the many helped through a micro-finance scheme. This was a joint effort of Project Topi and software consultancy firm Enablistic.

Project Topi will continue to work to provide development assistance, health care and education to the people in and around GIK Institute. It is true that one should not flaunt and brag about helping the needy. But, it is also important to let people inside and outside of GIKI know about the efforts that members of Project Topi are making in order to revive the sense of helping others. Our hope is that our efforts to provide opportunities to the people of the under-developed area around our Institute will inspire others to do the same in their communities.

To learn more and stay updated on the activities of Project Topi, email us at projecttopi@giki.edu.pk or follow us on Facebook.

Kaleem Ahmed is a undergraduate Senior at the Ghulam Ishaq Khan Institute of Engineering Sciences and Technology, majoring in Computer Science (Software Engineering). He is also the outgoing General Secretary of Project Topi. If you would like to spread the word about your student organization involved in philanthropic work in Pakistan, please email us at editors@nextstepforward.net.

STEP: Tell us a little bit about Mindstorm Studios . How and when did it start, how big is the team, and what have you been doing (in addition to Cricket Revolution and all)?

Babar Ahmed: Mindstorm Studios was actually my brother’s brainchild. I was still in the US when he decided he wanted to make a cricket game. He was in Dubai back then; this is summer 2006. So he upped and came to Lahore, at about the same time that I decided to move to Pakistan. Neither of us had ever lived here before (been in UAE and USA all our lives); so it was an “interesting” experience to say the least. I’m referring to breaking red lights in reverse at midnight in my spanking new 2006 creaky Alto! Coming from a culture that tickets you on breaking a STOP sign, it was a change! I started teaching at LUMS shortly and helped my brother found Mindstorm.

We’ve been through a few phases over the past years and have dabbled in quite a few areas such as 3D short film animation, architectural visualization, creative advertisement, casual games, and 3D games. If you check out www.mindstormstudios.com you’ll see remnants of some of our portfolios up there. Currently, we’re focused on game development for the iOS platform (iPhone and iPad). We’ve launched about 5 titles on the platform so far, with another 4 coming out soon, and have over 3 million cumulative downloads of our games.

STEP: You went to graduate school at Stanford and then came to Pakistan to kick off your company. How was the experience of doing a start up without the necessary support structure that exists in the Silicon Valley? Is there a nascent start-up culture emerging in Pakistan?

BA: As counter-intuitive as it might sound, it’s a LOT easier to do a startup in Pakistan than it is in the Valley! Here’s the simple reason why: $10,000 might last a startup in Pakistan 6 months… you’d be lucky to make it past your first month in the US with that money! Sure, raising that $10k is hard, but its no walk in the park in the US either. Additionally, you can get a LOT of mileage from family/seed funding here unlike in the US, where you HAVE to go for  Angel or VC funding very early in the company’s life cycle because costs are so high. Rent here is cheap, people typically have strong family support systems and you can work out of people’s basements (we all have those here), there’s VERY little red-tape in starting a company here. Picture this: 3 people, 3 laptops, a basement, a wimax connection, some pizza and coffee, and there you go! You have the next internet startup in Lahore!

In the US, man, its competitive! First off, you have visa issues: if you’re not working somewhere you can’t stay in the country. Gotta resolve those first! Then there’s the obnoxious cost of doing anything! Then, you have to convince people to LEAVE their $100k per year jobs and go out on a limb with you. Good luck doing that with a $10k budget! Moreover, if the people you’re trying to convince are good enough (and they SHOULD be), then you’ll have another 10 people like yourself with similar offers! And once you’ve managed all that, you have to get your idea in front of a VC who has another 1000 ideas or more sitting on his table waiting for his attention!  And IFFFFFF all of that works out for you, you give up a big chunk of your stake in your company to make it happen.

See where I’m going with this? It’s the age of connectivity. The only thing stopping you from reaching a gazillion people is yourself. Doesn’t matter where you’re sitting. For example, we have 2.5 million downloads of our game Whacksy Taxi on the iPhone. How many of those people know that just a few guys created that game in 7 weeks out of a dusty room in Lahore? Of course, it also depends on the TYPE of startup you want to do, but I really feel there’s a LOT that can be done regardless of your physical location, and that makes Pakistan a very attractive environment for startups.

STEP: A game studio is different from the usual software development company. What unique opportunities and risks did you experience in establishing a game company in Pakistan?

BA: Doing a game startup was particularly hard for us;  not having any experience in the space didn’t help much either! The issue with game development is, exactly as you put it, its not traditional software development. Its walking the middle line between the left brain and the right brain. Finding the right people and making them mesh together to deliver on a creative vision is no easy task. We faced loads of issues, from audio production to art direction to motion capture and physics engines and everything in between! One of the key issues in Pakistan is finding people with the right exposure; notice I didn’t say skill set. You get some pretty mean coders and artists here; however making a video game is like making a movie, or a song. You have to make something that’s cool and appeals and to your target market’s entertainment requirements, and for that you need to be exposed to what that market likes and doesn’t like. Also, given the maturity of tools these days, you don’t need an army of developers to make the next hit game; in fact, I’ve seen several 2 man teams that have been very successful in the mobile games business.

Pakistan posed its unique challenges, the least of which was electricity! Personally, the way the game development industry has rapidly transformed over the past 3 years, I don’t believe that physical locality impacts your ability to deliver entertainment any more. That might be the case if you’re trying to make a $50M production that rivals Halo. But you’re not! You no longer have to make Steven Spielberg-type movie productions; you just have to make the next YouTube hit and you’re home free. And trust me, you DON’T need a degree if film making to do that!

I’m not trying to trivialize making a startup or a successful company/product. It really IS hard! I’m just saying in this age of connectivity and information, it’s a lot less harder than it used to be. There are fewer and fewer business and trade secrets, there’s an abundance of knowledge and information, and there are several vehicles readily available to get your message/product in front of millions.

STEP: Let’s talk about Cricket Revolution. There is a flurry of start-up activity around iPhone and Android games. Mindstorm, like you said, is active on that front as well. What made you switch gears and target the classic PC gaming market?

BA: Well, it was actually the other way round for us. We started off as a classic PC game developer back in 2006 when touch interfaces still belonged in movies like Minority Report. And then Steve Jobs changed the world; 5 years later here we are with a strong iOS focus making games for the iPhone and the iPad. We still had to see our initial development through though, and managed to get Cricket Revolution out the door in late 2009.

STEP: How long did it take to develop Cricket Revolution? What were some of the biggest challenges in developing and marketing?

BA: Three and a half years. In hindsight, we could have done it a lot sooner, probably in two, but that’s if we had known then what we know now. During the course of development we thought our biggest challenge was animation and real-time multiplayer gameplay. How were we going to get 500 cricket animations into the game? We had to learn about motion capture, figure out that it was too expensive for us to afford, and then just figure out a hack-way of doing it ourselves at a fraction of the cost. Solving real-time multiplayer issues was a challenge – how were we going to get players across the globe to time their shot within a few milliseconds when the latency between them was over half a second to begin with? Well, we never DID solve that problem! So we had lots of online connectivity issues and what not. Other development issues were creating a custom physics engine, a custom animation engine, designing the game to hit that “sweet spot” which is very elusive to find (WHY is it that you like some songs and don’t like others? What’s the magic entertainment recipe?). But all that aside, we managed to plough through development and get the game out the door, a very tough 3 and a half years later.

It was only after that, that we realized we still had our biggest problem still ahead of us… and that was marketing! Hey, I’m an engineer, and that’s all I’ve been taught since high school. The only thing I had sold so far was virtual crops in Farmville! So, how in God’s name, were we going to get our product to sell millions of copies across multiple international markets? Well, that’s where the publisher comes in; unfortunately, we chose the wrong publisher and got burned. Our game didn’t do that well, and a lot of the selling was left on our shoulders. Alhamdulillah, we managed to overcome that challenge with a few well-timed deals with Pepsi in Pakistan and Valve’s digital distribution via Steam, but it was a VERY nerve wrecking few months getting those deals in place. It taught us a very important business lesson, and that is you have to begin your marketing activities from day 0, BEFORE production even begins. That’s a little hard to do given we’re an engineering driven company, but that’s the only thing that can convert a cool product into a successful business. No business, no product.

STEP: Has the game been a local success? Have you been successful in dealing with piracy in Pakistan (and many other cricket-loving nations)?

BA: Yes and no. I’ve actually sat at shops in Hafeez Center (Lahore) and watched people come in and purchase a pirated copy of our game for peanuts! It’s a fools wish to try and combat piracy in a country like Pakistan. We have a hard time enforcing Supreme Court laws on security, let alone international copyright laws on video games! So instead of fighting piracy in Pakistan, I decided to embrace it and give the game out for free instead. To do so, we brought Pepsi into the deal, sold the rights of the game to them in Pakistan, and had them distribute the game for free throughout the territory. Everyone wins. In India, the market is a little more mature and large enough for non-pirated content to make a mark. We had some successful deals there too with multiple retailers and distributors picking up our game and selling it through several outlet stores all over India. That, in addition to digital distribution via Steam, has resulted in a fairly wide adoption for our game, as far as independently produced PC games go.

STEP: Congratulations to you for Cricket Power becoming the official ICC World Cup game? How was the competition? What set Cricket Revolution apart from the rest?

BA: Thank you! I can’t speak for the competition; there are a few pretty good cricket games out there from the likes of EA and Codemasters. We pitched our game to a publisher, who then pitched it to the ICC; one thing led to another, ICC really liked our game, the publisher believed in our development capability, and lo and behold Cricket Power happened. The key was that we offered a complete 3D game served entirely in the browser, which was something that no one else had done in the past at the quality mark that we had. So we really had a product that stood out from the rest with a fairly small digital footprint in terms of download size. That, plus the fact that the game was redesigned for the casual audience in a pick up and play style gave it the boost it needed for selection. We’re really happy that we made it that far; hadn’t planned for it! But, alhamdulillah, the product shone through and here we are!

STEP: What’s next for Cricket Revolution and your company?

BA: We’re working hard on our next titles. We’re targeting the iOS primarily for now, so stay tuned for some releases soon! As far as Mindstorm goes, I really would like to see a game development industry grow in Pakistan by taking the lead from companies like ourselves and others who have gone down this path. I mean, game development is HUGE! Like, bigger than Hollywood HUGE! It’s not THAT hard to do, given the multitude of resources and tools available on the web. Pakistan is a low cost development center, you have everything you need on your laptop, and a single hit can make you good money! I would really like to see Pakistan come up on the global map for game development. A lot of countries are doing so, some with amazing government support (I believe Malaysia offers free electricity, office space, and 50% salary subsidy to game developers!!!!). I think if we can spawn a few startups in this space due to our efforts, and publicity that we’ve achieved, I would believe Mindstorm has truly done its job.

STEP: You also teach at LUMS. Do you think the Computer Science programs in our universities are adequately preparing students for a career in game development? If not, what needs to change?

BA: No, I don’t think they are. In my opinion, there are three aspects to this: a) Technical, b) Career, and c) Creativity. From a technical perspective, we’re more or less ok. Yes, we could do with a few courses targeted specifically to the game development pipeline to demystify the process for young minds. However, programming is just a small part of creating a game. Game design, production methods, audio production, quality assurance, and psychology are all equally important, to name a few. So, you CAN throw in game development courses into a CS curriculum, but unless a curriculum targets these other aspects that are equally important to game development, you’ll just end up with good programmers, which is good, sure, but only part of the equation. The second issue is a career perspective. Our professors and educators need to understand that game development is one of the hottest career choices on the planet right now, and will continue to be for some time. We have some serious cultural issues associated with games where the older generation believes that games are a total waste of time and not important. While they have a particular perspective, the world truly has changed. The average age of a gamer is now 35!! Everyone’s playing games! And unless our educators (and our families) treat this profession as a viable career choice, game development as a career just won’t get the adoption it deserves.

Lastly, the BIGGEST issue is creativity. Most curricula are designed to follow patterns; courses where there is a right answer and a wrong answer. The entire grading system is predicated on this one fact, and it has to be. This forces the mind to think along a certain line, a certain path, and move away from experimentation for fear of failure. This is a deeper psychological issue that can’t really be fixed just in a few courses. But I ask you, would you have guessed that a video like “Charlie Bit My Finger” would have 294 MILLION views on YouTube? Or do you think a game like “iFart” would make $100,000 in 2 weeks and be the #1 app on the App Store? I’m not saying that things like these always work. What I AM saying is that game developers need to think out of the box to truly define what entertainment value is, and it could be anything that our imagination allows it to be. I just don’t think our curricula are designed to grow that thought process and could do with a dash of imagination and fearless creativity.

According to the news reports published in The News and Dawn, the Implementation Commission of the 18th Amendment has decided to devolve Higher Education Commission to the provinces. From the details that have emerged so far, it appears that either HEC is being completely devolved to the provinces, or many of its powers will be transferred to the provinces. While the details of this plan are being worked out, we invite our readers to comment on the pros and cons of a complete or substantial devolution of HEC to provinces.

The justification being provided for the move is that the 18th constitutional amendment abolished the Concurrent List that allowed the Federal government to legislate on issues like “[c]urriculum, syllabus, planning, policy, centers of excellence, and standards of education” and “Islamic Education”. However the 18th constitutional amendment, while abolishing the Concurrent List has added a few entries to the Federal List that essentially account for HEC’s charter covered in the Higher Education Commission Ordinance 2002 that established the institution. The Federal List now includes,

• “Standards in institutions for higher education and research, scientific and technical institutions”.
• “National planning and national economic coordination including planning and coordination of scientific and technological research”.

These entries in the federal list indicate that the authors of the 18th amendment understood that there is a need to coordinate research and standards of higher education at a national level and there is a corresponding role for federal regulatory bodies like HEC in this space.

STEP believes that HEC has been able to bring about a sea change in the higher education landscape in Pakistan. While HEC has faced due criticism for its at times overly ambitious plans, such as the one to create new public sector universities, it has, to a large extent, promoted a research culture in Pakistani universities which was almost non-existent. Further, its programs on standardizing curricula and testing, combating rampant plagiarism through strict policies and monitoring, sending students to pursue their PhD from top-tier world universities, and connecting Pakistani universities to researchers all over the world through video conferencing have been quite successful.

Most important though is the institutional foundation that HEC provides. In a country with crumbling and crumbled institutions, and ineffective bureaucracy, HEC has certainly been one of the most responsive organizations. Throughout its existence, HEC has appeared willing to engage in a healthy debate about it proper role, the limits of its power and the efficacy of its policies with the all the stakes holders, including the students. In many ways, the open criticism of HEC in the op-ed columns and websites like ours is a reflection of both its impact and its openness. The role it has played in the politically-charged degree verification process points to its strength as an institution.

To conclude, Pakistan has a myriad of problems and millions of young Pakistanis with no access to quality higher education is high among them. There is no shortage of battles to be fought in finding the best way forward, and devolving the institution that has been leading the charge is certainly not the way to go. Instead, the focus of our efforts should be on building additional capabilities, at the federal, provincial, and district levels, and ensuring that HEC does the best possible job in coordinating these efforts as well as providing the institutional memory that is desperately required.

“If people in universities, who have the rare ability to convert research into products are not rewarded, and their careers are stifled, they will leave the country and go to the developed world where such abilities are very highly valued and rewarded. As a matter of fact this has already been happening for a number of years, and the country has suffered badly because of it.”

In our view, professors or students who have the ability to convert research into products are rarely, if ever, rewarded by universities anywhere in the world. Rather, it is the marketplace that rewards them: Bill Gates and Steve Jobs were college drop-outs who did not make their mark in the cocoon of a university fellowship program. Rather their ideas and innovation took off in the competitive environment of the open market.

Thus, while we agree that entrepreneurial individuals are sorely needed in the country to transfer the benefits of research and intellectual output at universities, we contend that it is not the mandate of the Higher Education to focus on incentivizing them directly.

HEC is not the panacea. It is one government agency, with limited clout and a shrinking budget. HEC’s focus must remain on allowing our universities to hire and retain the best and brightest researchers and educators that are available, and giving them the opportunity to reach their full potential. That in itself is a formidable task, and executing it well requires making difficult choices. HEC does need to “return to Pakistan” and focus on areas of research and inquiry that are more suitable for Pakistani researchers given our limited resources and our unique developmental needs. To this end, HEC can nudge researchers into areas that are most relevant to Pakistani context.

Government agencies and organizations, like the Ministry of Science and Technology and Pakistan Software Export Board, as well as public-private R&D funds, like the National ICT R&D Fund, need to play the leading role in commercializing research coming out of the universities. Organizations like the National ICT R&D Fund not only have the necessary funding base but their very structure as a public-private partnership makes them ideally suited to carry out this risky but essential purpose.

HoD Ahmad rightly points out that we need a sustained effort to invigorate the industrial base and subsequently create employment. Yet, it’s not the job of university professors; it will be an error to evaluate their worth from a task that is not theirs. Instead, alternative avenues should be provided to support people who have the “rare ability to convert research into products” to thrive and to do what they do best, while not distracting HEC from it core and vital purpose.

One reason so few Pakistani students are able to receive a quality education abroad is a lack of college application guidance in Pakistan. Each year, Pakistani students who are highly qualified and should be accepted to excellent colleges and universities abroad are unable to capitalize on their potential because they cannot navigate the increasingly complex college application process. Thousands of students each year receive either no counseling at all, or pay inordinate amounts of money to for-profit counseling companies that do nothing more than provide a copy of the free American Common Application. Most of these students are at a serious disadvantage when trying to continue their education.

In April 2009, a team of Pakistani and American undergraduate students studying at renowned universities around the world decided it was time to change this state of affairs. Together, they created Possibilities Pakistan, a free, equal access college counseling service available to all on line. The goal was simple – level the playing field.

Possibilities Pakistan is a non-profit project that aims to extend free guidance facilities for undergraduate education to all Pakistani students. It is a network of over two hundred dedicated students studying in stellar universities around the globe who are working together to help Pakistani high-school students applying to college find and apply to the right schools for them.

There are two halves to Possibilities Pakistan, a guidance service offered by those who have already succeeded at the application process, and a magazine that steers a prospective college student through applying to college. Both can be accessed at www.possibilitiespakistan.org.

The guidance service is run via email. Applicants send in their queries to possibilities.pakistan@gmail.com. Each applicant’s questions are put through to an appropriate member of the team, one who has faced a similar circumstance to the applicant and can appropriately answer his or her question. This ensures that applicants are never left out in the cold, unsure of how to manage confusing technical details of college applications like transcript deadlines and letters of recommendation. To date, over 200 students have taken advantage of this service, and many have received excellent placements at foreign universities.

Possibilities Pakistan also provides a free, 150-page online magazine which has been compiled with the help of high school guidance counselors, college students, and admissions office representatives from renowned international universities. The magazine starts off with a guidance section, which breaks down and discusses the complicated elements of the application process. Detailed subsections are dedicated to recommendation letters, transcripts, college essays, personal statements, SAT scores, college rankings, financial aid and pretty much anything you might need to know about getting into a foreign university. It also includes a ‘University Perspectives’ section, which has been compiled with the help of the extensive team behind Possibilities Pakistan. In this section, each of members of the Possibilities Pakistan team reviews his or her school in a manner designed to address the interests and concerns of Pakistani applicants. University of Pennsylvania, Caltech, Wesleyan University, College of Wooster, University of Nottingham, University of Glasgow, Mcgill University, University of Toronto, National University Singapore and Nanyang Technological University are all reviewed, along with many others. To date, the magazine has been viewed by thousands, and the organization is currently in the process of trying to print the magazine and distribute it to schools across the country.

Possibilities Pakistan isn’t about beating the system; rather it’s about laying bare the entire application process and helping to guide prospective students to acceptances at the schools of their dreams. It is free, high quality, and available to anyone. As a weak education system and socio-political problems pull Pakistan down, the need for a bright new class of young people ready to bring new ideas to get Pakistan back on track becomes more apparent by the day. However, the unfortunate reality is that to be the movers and shakers that Pakistan needs, our youth will need to receive a quality of education that is often not available at home and that is becoming increasingly difficult to begin abroad. Possibilities Pakistan hopes to change this reality. Ultimately, the aim is to bring about a revolutionary change by establishing free educational guidance for all Pakistanis.

Anyone interested in taking advantage of Possibilities Pakistan’s services, or in helping to further the mission, can email us, or join us on Facebook.

The author is a student at the Lahore School of Economics and the Director of Marketing and Outreach for Possibilities Pakistan.

When did your involvement with GIK Institute start? What was the vision for GIKI and, after 17 years, is GIKI where you envisioned it to be?

I was among the people, including several foreign professors, invited by then-President Ghulam Ishaq Khan — around 1989-90 — for  brainstorming sessions about the proposed Institute. The idea of starting a private university in science and engineering was quite novel [at the time] for Pakistan, and it was meant to be an instrument for breaking out of the mediocrity trap gripping Pakistan’s other engineering Universities.

My dream was for GIKI to become a community of self-governing scholars, a place where reason and innovation would rule and where the only thing that matters – the quality of student emerging from it – would be at the center of all our efforts.  These graduates would also be proficient in their work and aware of their own cultural heritage as well as those of other people, and  imbued with the processes of (mathematical) reasoning. This dream is yet incomplete as it requires civilizing the engineers and scientists also!

What are the obstacles to achieving this vision?

The reasons go back to the founding of the Institute. [At the time of its founding] I disagreed with Topi as the site, and preferred an urban setting near Nowshera, on the main highway and close to a strong industrial cluster, since it was going to be set up in the then-NWFP (now re-named as Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa). President Ghulam Ishaq Khan may have been persuaded by his close associations with WAPDA to set it up next to Tarbela Dam, but this decision has been the fatal flaw holding back GIKI from reaching its true potential. It hardly mattered in the years before HEC started injecting funds into the higher education sector but now it is critical, as GIKI has little access to public funds. My fear is that GIKI will price itself out of the market.

My other recommendation was also not followed in letter and spirit. I had done my undergraduate from Oxford (its engineering department was called the Engineering Sciences Dept .), and remembered it as a program which enabled one to go into manufacturing, or research, or business [after graduation]. It stressed the blurring of boundaries between engineering and physical sciences. GIKI’s name does have the words “Engineering Sciences” in it, and there is a faculty of Engineering Sciences, but it is not really in the same spirit of the 100-year old model at Oxford, where every student had to take all subjects (electronics and electrical engineering, computers, heat engines and thermodynamics, mechanical and other civil structures, fluid flows), and then take 3-4 additional advanced courses [in the area of his or her specialization].

When were you brought on-board as the Rector, and when and why did you leave?

I was asked and agreed to become the Rector in June 2008 to but left in January 2009 for one major reason. The Taliban fell in love with me and accused me in a letter in November 2008 of spreading immorality and organizing mehfils of ‘raqs-o-saroor‘, apart from espousing the ideas of the Americans and the Jews, etc., etc. Also, I am quite an independent person, one who has made his own decisions, and it riled me that their shoora had decided to ‘send me to jahannum’ without asking me first!

My focus was always the well-being of the students and to see that they got their money’s worth. I interacted with faculty and students intensively to improve the delivery of education. I also pulled up the administration for their general apathy. I insisted on hygiene and cleanliness in the hostels and dining halls, started improving their sports facilities, and offered to arrange proper music lessons. I encouraged them to patronize local Swabi talent rather relying on relatively expensive pop concerts. I also asked them to be irreverent — to avoid obscurantist dogmas by questioning assumptions, and to remember that no mullah is remembered in Muslim history, while scholars such as Ibn Khaldun and Bu Ali Sina are honoured.  Imagine my frustration at not being able to have even a discussion with the Taliban!

The students were my first concern and without raising alarms, I brought this [letter from the Taliban's shoora] to the notice of the Federal Interior Ministry, which helped to increase police patrolling on the two major roads to Islamabad and Peshawar to prevent any harm to the students. My family came to know only in Jan 2009 and were quite hysterical. So, I decided to quit. Remember, Swat was only an hour away and the military operation against the Taliban did not start for another 10 weeks. There was also the strange case related to the revival of the hair cutting saloon on the campus for female students and faculty wives. This was opposed by a couple of senior (!) faculty wives as being un-Islamic. Incidentally this facility is doing very well.

But, you’re still associated with the Institute (as the Executive Director of SOPREST). What are you working on now?

After the sad demise of Mr. H.U. Baig, I was asked in March 2010 to take over as Executive Director of SOPREST, the society which runs GIKI. I have done so on the understanding that we will be working towards setting up three new Schools of Business, Public Policy, and the Social Sciences in Islamabad under the SOPREST banner.  I am happy to report that the BoG of SOPREST approved this program on its meeting of 17th September.

This new campus is expected to have some 2500 students in place in 10 years. It will provide an integrated approach to business, management, public policy, and simulations and modeling of issues pertaining to problems peculiar to this century, such as security and affordability of energy, water and food. We have requested 50 acres from CDA near Rawal Dam, while a partnership is possible with another Foundation on a 300 acre site near DHA/Bahria.

The support of GIKI alumni will be extremely critical in making this a success. Our alumni  have made a name for themselves, in Pakistan and abroad, and I request them all to support us with suggestions and networking for acquiring talented faculty and, of course, donations. Their advice and experience will be extremely valuable for making GIKI a true University. Our target is to raise some 50 % of the Rs 1.2 billion we will be spending on the venture in the next 5 years. We intend to manage the remainder amount.

A final question about GIKI. Your son was a student at GIKI back in the 90s. If you had the option of sending your son to GIKI now, would you still send him there or to another institute?

[Laughter]. I will probably send him [to GIKI]. It is still one of the best places for engineering in Pakistan.

Moving away from GIKI/SOPREST… You did some pioneering work on lasers in Pakistan, work that can be an example for scientists returning to Pakistan. How did it all start, what did you accomplish and do you see a bright future for the work you started?

It was really exciting! I started as a one-man laser group in 1969 but gradually we developed a very good team. We all complemented one another and we all gave generously of our time.

We built lasers, we used them, and we generated over five billion rupees of revenue through product development over 20 years. Our lasers are leveling farm land in Pakistan and reducing water consumption by more than a third.  I met the Director of the Biotech Institute in South India recently, and was pleased to know that 3 of our land levelers were purchased by them for reverse engineering. Recently, I helped design the position monitoring system for the thousands of detectors in the CMS at CERN in Geneva. All 40 systems have been made in my labs and have been incorporated at CERN’s CMS, and our lasers and precision optics have been used in Germany, Switzerland, and Spain apart from S.E. Asia.

I lapsed from active science in 2005 when I joined the Planning Commission but I’ve been back to my lab about 4 to 5 times, though we stay in touch. Lasers has a good future in Pakistan, and is in good hands.  The National Laser Labs is now being put together, and will commence shortly. I am content that there may now be more people working in lasers in the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission than in nuclear physics!

You’ve had a remarkable career in academia, in research labs and in the government as member of the Planning Commission. What do you consider to be your most significant accomplishment? How would you like to be remembered ?

An embarrassing question! I think my legacy would be the starting of a completely new field in Pakistan: Lasers.

Spoken like a true scientist! One final question. Did your work in the government make you more hopeful about Pakistan’s future or less?

Planning Commission was an enormous learning experience for me. I initially looked after science and technology, higher education and industry (a good combination) and later education and health also. This was my first experience of working in the ‘Government’ and I was a bit surprised at the lack of institutional memory and just downright laziness and incompetence. I hope I raised the quality of discourse and analysis.

My biggest challenge [at the Commission] was the Vision 2030 project – trying to identify the most likely future for Pakistan among the many that were possible or desirable. This document is now largely forgotten in the middle of the political changes of the last two years, but going through this exercise really gave me a lot of hope about the future of Pakistan.

I am confident about the role for Pakistan in this century. We are not too small as to be irrelevant, in fact we are the about right population size and our younger people carry far less historical baggage; they are enterprising, more selective and also more demanding in terms of quality.

On that optimistic note, thank you very much, Dr. Khan and our best wishes.

Thank you.

Let’s start by talking about the recent funding crisis at the HEC and the universities. Do the universities have a point that current funding is simply inadequate? Is there a way out?

The Universities are quite vulnerable as regards their development budgets, which are frozen except for the projects nearing completion. I believe considerable funds have been released for their operational expenditures and the critical moment is over.

I must point out that while the HEC has done excellent work by focusing on developing the physical and intellectual infrastructure and hence access to higher education, this growth cannot continue at such a high rate indefinitely. The Universities have been conditioned by HEC to expect funding increases every year, with few serious reviews in place. In fact, (until recently) HEC was expecting 20-26 % increase in funds annually for the foreseeable future, which was simply not sustainable.

The recent funding crisis was foreseen earlier, and the HEC was cautioned as far back in 2007 by the Planning Commission – where I looked after Higher Education – to pause and consolidate, to slow down expansion, and concentrate on quality matters, which is perhaps more important than mere numbers. After all the only deliverable from a University is its graduates and their competence and ability in meeting the demands of the very competitive 21st century. This does not mean, as some have suggested recently, that the HEC and Universities should not have received large funding at all. However, this crisis has thrown up the opportunity for a major review of the HEC itself, and address the issues of its organizational efficiency, and decision framework. Of particular importance are activities related to funding for research, accreditation, and rankings which needs to be reviewed for potential conflict of interest. This is extremely urgent under the new devolution regime.

Please remember that Pakistan is not unique in facing this problem. Higher education and its funding is in crisis everywhere. This is why Western Universities solicit students from countries such as Pakistan so that they can continue to subsidize their own students one way or the other. Coming now to the present, even without a financial crisis as at present, this tapering off of funds would have happened, but it should have been gentler and more gradual. With the economy being badly hit by several factors such as the global crisis in financial sector, inflation in fuel and food prices, war in Afghanistan next door, and now the floods; all have heightened the fragility of governance and macroeconomic instability.

The current stress on the Universities is expected to continue.

What is the way out?

First, reduce costs, and mobilize other resources simultaneously, with a moratorium on new development projects for at least 3-4 years. The word should be: Consolidate. There is just not enough faculty to allow further expansion, and the result of this shortage is that we have a ‘teach – hop – teach’ syndrome exploited by roaming ‘visiting faculty’. While a few thousand PhDs will no doubt be joining Pakistani universities in the near future, I do not buy into the argument that a freshly returned PhD , no matter how talented, must also be a good teacher.

Ultimately it comes down finally to increasing internal efficiencies. Increase the student: teacher ratios to 25 instead of 18 to one, and reduce the very high ratio of non-teaching staff to total staff in Universities. This hasn’t changed much over the years and need to come down to 1:1 from the current 3:1 Perhaps more mergers may be the answer, as there are too many small, non-critical, and hence inefficient institutions operating in Pakistan. Hardly any University has enrollment on its own campus(es) of 15,000 to 25,000 students. I ignore affiliated colleges, which offer two year degrees.

Given the funding shortfall we’re likely to face even in the future, isn’t increasing the tuition fee a prudent option? Shouldn’t public universities be responsible for generating at least some significant portion of their operating expenditure?

Public universities certainly need to generate more funds themselves, and should also be more prudent in expenditures, because the desired funds will just not be available. Let me give you an idea of the expected shortfall. According to the HEC’s  Medium Term  Development Framework (MTDF 2005-2015) the projected expenditures are  Rs 1150 billion over this period.  The resultant shortfall would be nearly Rs 600 billion unless  additional resources are harnessed, as pointed out by the World Bank in late 2006. Such expenditures are neither feasible nor justified given the national  tax : GDP ratio  of only about 10%. The matter is made worse by the increasing burden of pensions and major increase in emoluments of all employees.

What are the possible solutions?

First, the HEC must slow down the pace of development and expansion, and should stop any new programmes for 4-5 years.

Second, there is no choice but to increase tuition fees, which is admittedly likely to result in higher unit costs / student apart from slowing the growth in enrolment and increasing the inequities already existing in the country’s education structure. On the other hand, it is argued that Higher Education provides an economic advantage to those who get it, and no fees (or low fees) gives an unfair economic facility to those who can afford to pay.

This is not easy to implement, as it is linked with the sensitive question about how much cost recovery is reasonable. All public universities should be encouraged to progressively generate at least 50% of their operational expenses within five years, coupled with rigorous means testing for financial assistance in order to preserve some equity. The concept of interest-free student loans from an expanded Student Fund needs to be visited, with the loans being paid back after obtaining jobs.

Thirdly, we need to recall our traditional concept of waqf through land being attached to universities for their upkeep. All our major mosques and madrassa have such endowments. Oxford and Cambridge are the biggest landlords in the UK while land-grant universities in the USA have also been quite successful. Some Pakistani universities have plenty of spare land even after decades of existence, and can use some of it to generate some revenues. Vertical physical growth will also be more efficient in space utilization. This also means raising and managing endowment funds from alumni and businessmen.

Fourthly, HEC needs to improve its own internal efficiencies as well as of universities (student teacher ratios, faculty: non-faculty numbers, better trained and educated administrative personnel). While the operational costs of HEC are of the order of 3% of its operational funding of universities, it is too high when the sheer disparity in its personnel numbers versus all the universities is taken into account.

Fifth, the HEC needs to revisit all the incentives it offered to university faculty for doing research and supervising PhD students. This may no longer be valid now with much enhanced faculty salaries, and will reduce the operating costs considerably.

Sixth, the student numbers being sent abroad for MS or PhD need to be reduced in the proportion of the returning PhD scholars from abroad, as more and more PhD work should be done progressively within the country.

All these measures have to be applied simultaneously.

What do you make of the role that the private sector is playing in higher education in Pakistan? Current and likely future funding shortfalls for public sector universities will likely increase the role that private universities are playing? How can that be managed better?

The private sector is already very active in higher education, with some 35 % of enrollment, and 60 private universities as against 75 public institutions. It can make even greater contribution by reducing the burden on the public exchequer, specially in the present crisis, where its role can be more efficient in providing access to higher education. Even though private Institutions are generally smaller, and more expensive, their graduates such as from GIKI and LUMS  are well regarded by academia, business and industry.

It would be necessary to provide the private sector a more level playing field by making them eligible for state R& D funds, which should be neutral and depend only on the quality of proposal. At the same time, they will need they need to submit to greater regulation, scrutiny,  and transparency in quality and financial matters, in regard to full-time faculty and the exemption from income tax.

In our interview with Dr. Asad Abidi, he talked about the importance of vocational training and how most of the industrial economies were built on vocational training. Why hasn’t that happened in Pakistan? And, would establishing vocational training institutions not have been a better investment of public funds than sending students for PhDs, funding research at local universities,  and other programs that HEC started ?

I agree entirely with Dr Asad Abidi.  We cannot increase our economic envelope without raising our collective competence, which alone will ensure our breaking out of the low skills, low productivity, low expectations trap. Just 1% of our 12-17 age group are enrolled in some skill-development programme as compared with, say, Turkey which enrolls nearly 21% of this age cohort.  Why is this so? It is not glamorous enough. We have more doctors than nurses and more engineers than technicians. However, it is not an either-or situation.

We have to improve the quality of students entering University; even more important we need to make secondary education economically relevant, which requires rapid increase in funding for schools and colleges.

We now need to move beyond merely higher education and focus on schools and colleges, specially the neglected transition link between school education and economically relevant skills. After all the knowledge worker in the 21st Century is as much the switchboard operator, or the admissions clerk in a college or the person behind the sales counter or the fisherman and farm worker, as is a PhD.

I feel that the vocationalisation of secondary education (class 8-10) with one or more vocational tracks offered to complement traditional schooling will help reduce school dropouts and improve productivity. It will also make our young people more employable, and keep them away from social distress and mischief. When I left GIKI as Rector, I went back briefly to the Planning Commission and managed to produce a policy paper on expanding quality and relevance of vocational/technical education. This has been accepted by the CDWP and also recently accepted by USAID one of three major reforms needed in Pakistan’s education sector.

Do remember that university and vocational training are not an either-or choice. Both are essential, and with universities now approaching a certain threshold, it is possible to shift the focus to the neglected technical training sector.

I estimate that it will cost a fifth per student per year for a technical diploma /certificate as compared with a university undergraduate degree, with earlier economic returns.

In Part 2 of our conversation with Dr. Shaukhat Hameed Khan we talk about GIKI and Dr. Khan’s experience working as the Rector of GIKI.