LAHORE: Federal Minister for Planning, Development & Special Initiatives, Ahsan Iqbal on Monday pledged early construction of the main campus of the Information Technology University (ITU) on Barki Road and bring the issue to the Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s attention.

He was addressing the students and faculty of the ITU at the Arfa Software Technology Park on the Ferozepur Road.

During his visit, the minister inaugurated the Engineering Innovation Exhibition and observed the demonstration of engineering, virtual reality spatial AI projects by the students.

Later, he addressed the students and faculty members on “Artificial Intelligence, Robotics, Cyber Security and Pakistan’s Future”.

Ahsan Iqbal stressed the revival of knowledge economy as per the Vision 2025 envisioned by him in 2013.

“In pursuance of that goal, the youth of Pakistan has a pivotal role to play. To that end, it is important that positive synergies are created for collaboration instead of differences.”

The minister said the ITU was playing a significant role in equipping the youth with the latest skills.

The ITU was envisioned as a start-up and now it had grown beyond its limited space at the Arfa Karim Tower.

“Time has come for the ITU to move to its new campus and give space to another start-up in its place.”

ITU Vice Chancellor Dr Adnan Noor Mian also addressed the students, saying that the ITU was built to replicate the model of top IT universities like the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs). Now after 10 years of its founding, he said, the ITU had been able to attract and retain top-notch faculty from across the world. Mr Mian said the faculty members had published groundbreaking research papers in top journals and had also accomplished projects worth millions of dollars.

He added the ITU offered 17 undergraduate and graduate programmes with almost 1,500 currently enrolled students.

The ITU VC regretted that the biggest issue ITU faced was that of space constraint at the Arfa Software Technology Park.

Dr Faisal Kamiran also spoke while former ITU VC Dr Sarfraz Khurshid, registrar, deans, chairpersons and faculty were present.

Published in Dawn, May 30th, 2023