HYDERABAD, Oct 25: Students of the Mehran University of Engineering and Technology have obtained third position and cash award of Rs20,000 at the sixth South Asian Telecommunication Regulators' Council held at the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority headquarters in Islamabad.

In a statement issued here on Monday, a university spokesman said that a group of three final-year students of the Department of Electronic and Telecommunication Engineering - Nasrullah Pirzada, Naveed Ahmed Umrani and Atfi Zaki - participated in a paper-writing competition on "A Sustainable ICT Project for Rural Pakistan".

In the competition, 84 papers from various private and public universities of the country were presented.

The project was supervised jointly by Professor Dr B.S. Chaudhary, chairman of the Department of Electronic and Telecommunication Engineering, and Professor Dr A.K. Baloch, co-director of the Institute of Information Technology.

STUDENTS PUNISHED: The MUET has imposed a fine of Rs75,000 on 10 students for making a nuisance of themselves by disrupting peace, academic activities, exploding firecrackers, beating drums, splashing colour, and generally participating in a week-long act of hooliganism at the campus.

A notification by the university registrar, issued on October 21, said that a fine of Rs10,000 each has been imposed on five students and Rs5,000 each on the other five. They have been asked to deposit the amount in the bank account of the university, failing which they will not be allowed to appear in the regular eighth term final year examination.