By Syed Wahaj Ahmed
Almost 48,000 students of University of Sindh (SU) Jamshoro will be able to make better use of an online banking system of Habib Bank Limited (HBL) in terms of depositing various fees without facing any ordeal of standing in long queues.
“Students are really dear to us who should not undergo any trouble regarding banking on the campus,” SU Vice Chancellor Prof Dr Muhammad Siddique Kalhoro said, adding that the 1Link agreement had been signed with HBL in a bid to save students from standing for hours in long queues outside the bank for the purpose of depositing fees.
The SU and HBL inked a memorandum of understanding (MoU) in connection with the digitization of university fee collection through 1Link as students now could deposit various fees including admission one, while staying at home through a mobile App of any bank for want of any printed challans.
The MoU was signed between SU’s Director Finance Zeeshan Memon and HBL’s Regional Head Distribution Hyderabad Parvez Ahmed Panhwar during a ceremony held at the Senate Hall of the VC Secretariat of the varsity, presided over by the VC, attended by many officials of the varsity and the bank.
Speaking at the programme, the VC said that the University of Sindh since its inception provided a safe environment to HBL, endowed with free electricity facility and never charged any rent for the building on the campus.
“We always want one thing that the bank should ensure facilities and better services to students, employees and pensioners, but the purpose is not yet being served truly,” he said.
He said that a bank counter was situated at the varsity’s admin block called AC2 too, where such facilities were not being provided by the bank, leaving the students in lurch, resulting in long queues in sweltering heat.
He said that the accord would benefit around 48,000 students, 3,000 employees, 1,800 pensioners and alumni in terms of depositing any fees of various documents from anywhere through this App of any bank without undergoing any problems of long queues.
The VC said that the online system would do away with the manual work and the paid amount in any branch across the country would be transferred into the varsity’s bank accounts.
Speaking on the occasion, HBL Distribution Head of Hyderabad Region Parvez Ahmed Panhwar said that owing to the country’s financial situation, the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) had banned the import of ATM machines, consequently, the bank authorities had not yet been able to install the required ATM machine outside Sindh University’s AC-II, but the machine were approved.
He said that after improvement of financial conditions of the country in the next four to six months and grant of permission for importing equipment, the ATM machine will be imported from abroad and installed at the bank counter in AC-II.
He said that the fee collection of the university in various cities was being processed manually, which took a lot of time in transferring the account into the varsity’s bank accounts, adding that according to the agreement, the fee collection in the different branches of HBL across the country would be made centralized resulting in transfer of the funds into the SU accounts. He assured that the 1Link system will be operational within a month.
Earlier, the VC decorated the HBL team members with Sindhi Ajrak.
Meanwhile, SU is a popular and old university in the public sector in the interior of Sindh where students are willing to seek admissions to disciplines respectively. Moreover, hundreds of students are seen depositing their various fees standing in long queues in sweltering heat outside bank branches in many districts including Jamshoro, Hyderabad, Matiari, Tando Mohammad Khan, Tando Allahyar, Sanghar, Mirpurkhas, Badin, Thatta, Sujawal and other districts of the province.
Knowledgeable article
Depositing fees online is a good initiative.