Syed Rizwan Ali, the Manager, Business Incubation Center (BIC) of Bahria University, Karachi is satisfied with the quality of engineering education for sailing smoothly with China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC).

More importantly, he and his team are striving to introduce some product or a service for the corridor initiative which may bring distinction to engineers in Pakistan.

Talking to Engineering Review, Mr Ali who has done MS in CAAD from the United Kingdom shared details how Bahria University and his centre are playing part in engineering education in Pakistan. “Besides offering degree courses in Engineering Science, Bahria had recently launched doctorate programs in marine sciences and humanities and social sciences”.

Syed Rizwan revealed his incubation centre had the prestige to win the first two positions in Microsoft Competition 2018 in which around 120 universities of Pakistan took part. BIC’s five projects reached the final stages, he said. They were endorsed by the organizers. The project which secured top position was related to creating a conducive atmosphere for asthma patients.

Bahria is among those universities which have begun Chinese Language courses and here a six monthly course is being ratified by Confucius Center, Karachi University. He said if any Pakistani achieved a command over the Chinese language, he can get a job of interpreter too.

Affiliated with software engineering along with his professional experience, Rizwan is agreed with the fact that over 95 per cent of Pakistani software companies is doing foreign projects. Why are they unable to cater to the local market? They lacked creativity and fail to find solutions to local problems. Local companies get the projects of the US and find cheap labour for earning US dollars. Until and unless we go for finding solutions of local problems, our industry would not grow, he said.

Rizwan is not satisfied with software export at all. He believes we in Pakistan are always late and talk too much rather than working. In 2001, there was wind for call centers. We were late and the projects moved to the south. We remained busy organizing seminars only. Same happened when there was a move for big data. Now again we are merely talking about entrepreneurship.

“We have a potential for exporting software but branding and credibility are two essentials which are absent here.” He said. For instance, Microsoft and Oracle are brands which people buying with confidence which is missing here. Also, he added transfer of payments is a big issue.

On academia and industry linkage, Syed Rizwan has many success stories. Bahria University had taken an initiative in 2001 under which the Corporate Advisory Committee (CAC) was formed. They were supposed to invite industry and create an atmosphere for industry-faculty discussion for resolution of the issues of the industry. Now CACs are upgraded as SCACs—Strategic Corporate Advisory Committees.

How does Industry respond to academia? It’s good, he responds. We organize an interaction every 6 months. Most recently, the university invited industry’s input in designing maritime courses at an international conference. He, however, experiences issues in process of interaction between academia and the industry. “Industry does not share its problems because it does not trust academia. They think they are just teachers. Partly, the industry does have a point and the teachers lack professional experience. They go directly to teaching profession after finishing their education. They do not get professional exposure unlike other countries where professional experience is a must for teaching in any institution.

Syed Rizwan sees Pakistan Engineering Council (PEC) and Higher Education Commission (HEC) on the same page for improving the quality of education in Pakistan. “PEC is doing good in terms of accreditation and teaching that helped as regards Washington Accord”, he concludes. – By Muhammad Salahuddin.

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