KARACHI:“Today Pakistan is facing big problems of population growth, water shortage and corruption. Without resolving these problems, the country couldn’t move forward. There is also a lack of quality education in the country that is why a large number of students couldn’t succeed to get total number of scholarships specially of USA and European countries,” a noted intellectual, who also served the World Bank for some time, said Thursday.
The people of Sindh from Jacobabad to Karachi are drinking impure water, which develops fatal diseases like cancer in the common man,” he said while speaking at an interaction session with the faculty of Sindh Madressatul Islam University (SMIU) on the subject of “Opportunities and Challenges for People of Pakistan” at the Senate Hall of the university.
Referring his recent visits to Larkana, Sukkur, Khairpur Mirs, Sehwan, Bhit Shah, Karachi and other cities of Sindh, Memon said that he found huge population growth in each and every city of the province, which he had not witnessed earlier. He suggested that the population growth must be controlled and people should be provided employment opportunities.
Memon, who had also served The National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (NEPRA) in 1996, further said that he had found extreme rich and extreme poor people in Pakistan. Reciting an example from China, he said that with the economic policies of Chinese government, millions of people of the country had grown from poor to middle class in recent years.
Sharing his experiences while serving with World Bank in different countries, Memon said that in the late 1960s, there was not a big issue of water in Singapore and they were purchasing it from Malaysia, but today Singapore has resolved its said problem including other many problems and emerged as one of the most developed countries of the world.
He said: “In Singapore and in the USA, an elected representative is not going to sleep for next four or five years after getting vote from the people. The democracies of Singapore and USA have played a major role in the wellbeing of their people and development of the countries, because they have addressed the basic problems of masses. If an elected representative is not remained in contact with their voters, they will not elect him/her in the next elections, but in our country, the elected representatives are not giving proper attention to the issues of their voters.”
He advised the teachers to provide top quality education to students and guide them about their career.
Dr Muhammad Ali Shaikh, Vice Chancellor of SMIU in his speech welcomed the guest and said that there were so many success stories in the country and we were proud of that. He said that today a large number of universities had been established in the country, which were trying to provide quality education. “Also, there is a huge talent in the country, but there is a need of capacity building of youth, teachers, common man, institutions and organizations and with that the problems could be resolved.”
The session was attended by deans, chairpersons, faculty members and other officials of SMIU.