Pakistan & Gulf Economist

Ihsan Trust – A Beacon of Hope for Higher Education in Pakistan

Fayyaz Ur Rehman Khan

Pakistan – a country of over 220 million souls, although being the 05th (fifth) largest (Population wise) country of the world, yet it has not been able to fully tap the potential and resources and has literacy rate being less then 60%. Accordingly, the percentage of population seeking/getting Higher Education is much, much lower.

As such, there’s no dearth of talent and genius minds in the country, the access to Higher Education has always remained a big hurdle keeping in view access to the universities (geographical area wise population distribution), the fee structures, lack of information etc. Although the public sector Universities and Higher Education Institutes in the country have highly subsidized fee structure, yet these have never been able to accommodate all the students seeking Higher Education. Also, most of the sought after and top universities of the country are in Private sector with fees much higher than public sector universities. Even in public sector universities, a certain portion is reserved for getting admission on “Self Finance” basis and that fee is relatively higher and often unaffordable to the students.

Universities like Ghulam Ishaq Khan University, LUMS, IBA, NUST, Habib University, KSBL Aga Khan University, etc are considered as the best universities in the country but they do have higher fee structures as well. These universities do provide lots of scholarships and grants, still the requirement for financial assistance is huge.

In this scenario, one of the biggest ray of hope and light for the students has been “Ihsan Trust” – A Beacon of Hope for Higher Education in Pakistan.

Founded and Registered as a Trust in Jan 2010 (under Trust Act 1882), Ihsan Trust (IT) is basically a “WAQF” which has so far enlightened the lives of many needy but talented students and because of Ihsan Trust’s assistance, a lot of families have come out of the vicious poverty cycle. The aim of IT is to reach out and help the poor and needy without any religion, cast, gender discrimination etc so as to take care and look after their well being and to encourage the socio-economic uplift of the low-income community and to increase the economic prosperity of the society, ultimately contributing towards the betterment of our beloved country Pakistan.

Ihsan Trust is fully working on its mission to provide assistance to the students (lacking financial resources) seeking higher education across Pakistan. It has Memorandum of Understanding with around 150 universities and Professional bodies (so far) across Pakistan and is providing the “Interest Free Loan” facility to their needy students.

Alhamdolillah, with more than 4,000 students already provided this facility, the aim is to increase the number gradually and for this “IT” is continuously reaching out to more universities and professional bodies in order to achieve its mission and objectives. The aim is to provide assistance to the students to gradually crossing 5,000 figure mark by the year end 2023 and reaching up to 10,000 students by year end 2025.

Some of the top universities with which IT is working and providing financial assistance to its students are:

IT is currently the largest Interest Free Loan provider for Higher Education in Pakistan. Besides the regular Interest Free Loan facility, IT also provides regular support and funding for the premier business School of Pakistan i.e. Institute of Business Administration’s (IBA) Karachi’s National Talent Hunt Program (known as “IBA Ihsan Trust National Talent Hunt Program”) and to date has sponsored over 400 students pursuing their Bachelors Degree Program from IBA.

Alhamdolillah, not only IT is being recognized as a major player in financing and supporting the Higher Education in the country, but IT’s contributions have also been recognized globally as well. Ihsan Trust has received the “Islamic Economy Award 2017” in Dubai in Nov 2017. The annual award recognizes innovative world-class business initiatives and ideas that have contributed to the social and economic welfare of the Muslim population. Of the total nine (09) categories, Ihsan Trust won the award in the category of “Waqf and Endowment.” A real honor that an organization from Pakistan was selected and awarded at the Global level. Ihsan Trust was the only Organization from Pakistan which won the award in any category (out of all nine categories) in those 2017 Awards.

This award is a symbol of appreciation, honour, a testimonial of recognition of Ihsan Trust’s services, increasing our credibility, reputation and top of it acknowledgement of our selfless services and efforts to help and assist the poor and needy and reinvigorate the concept of “Waqf” in Islamic world.

With duly certified by “Pakistan Centre for Philanthropy (PCP)” Ihsan Trust is continuously working on its mission to enable the students (on merit) of Pakistan to take admission in their choice of University and choice of program without worrying about the fee and financial resources.

With considerable increase in the fee structures of all the universities across Pakistan and the overall recent economic condition, we are receiving a large number of requests for IT’s Interest-free loan facility from all over Pakistan. However, this requires huge amount of funds in order to assist future Engineers, Doctors, Pharmacists, Business professionals, Lawyers, Educationalists, Journalists, Chartered Accountants etc in getting their Higher/Professional Education.

Aiming to provide assistance to more and more needy students and increase the number to atleast 10,000 students by the year end 2025, we are eagerly looking for more funds to keep our Philanthropic work going and increasing so as to achieve our targets in an efficient and effective manner, thus reducing absolute poverty in Pakistan.

May Allah accept all our sincere efforts – Ameen!!

For further details about Ihsan Trust, kindly visit its website www.ihsantrust.org and the Facebook page www.facebook.com/ihsantrust.

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