SWABI, March 16: Postgraduate classes of an engineering university being built in Sialkot with the collaboration of the Swedish government will commence later this year on a temporary campus in Lahore.

Members of a delegation of the Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, said during a visit to the Ghulam Ishaq Khan Institute of Engineering Sciences and Technology that the Sialkot campus was likely to be inaugurated in 2009.

They said that about 100 postgraduate students would be offered admission in the first batch. The undergraduate programmes would be launched on the Sialkot campus in 2009, with the induction of 200 students.

The university will offer degrees in chemical engineering and bio-technology, information technology, industrial and production engineering, infrastructure and building and environment engineering. A department of basic sciences is also planned.

They said the establishment of the institution was part of the Higher Education Commission’s programme to set up eight world-class engineering universities in collaboration with the developed countries.

The Swedish delegation comprising Prof Ake C. Rasmuson, Goran Melin, Bengt Sedvall, Susanne Odung, Jan Boija and Christian Frisenstam was accompanied by Dr Mohammad Mujahid and Ahmad Shahzad Memon of the HEC.

Prof Rasmuson said the Swedish university would introduce its own education system but it had not yet been decided whether it would have a Pakistani or a Swedish charter.

Dr Mujahid said: “Other European powers, like France, Germany, Italy and Austria, are also establishing engineering universities in Pakistan.”

Sweden will provide technical expertise for the university through the vice-chancellor, senior professors, examination system, quality assurance and training of faculty, whereas the Pakistan government will provide the finances.

The academics of the GIK Institute and the Royal Institute of Technology discussed collaboration for promoting mutually beneficial interaction in engineering education and research. They also discussed details of exchanging students and faculty.