Daily Times

The National University of Sciences & Technology (NUST) paid glowing tributes to its distinguished faculty and staff upon conferment of the prestigious Civil Awards 2023 by the President Islamic Republic of Pakistan, H.E Dr Arif Alvi. The Investiture Ceremony will take place on Pakistan Day, 23rd March, 2024. Meanwhile, Registrar NUST Engr Brig Muhammad Ashfaq Maitla has been conferred Sitara-e-Imtiaz (M), in recognition of his meritorious services during his illustrious career.

Dr Faisal Shafait from NUST School of Electrical Engineering & Computer Science (SEECS) and Dr Umar Shahbaz from NUST College of Electrical & Mechanical Engineering (CoEME) have been conferred the coveted Pride of Performance, while Dr M Usman Akram from CoEME, Dr Salman Raza Naqvi from NUST School of Chemical & Materials Engineering (SCME), Dr Haider Abbas from NUST Military College of Signals (MCS) and Ms Arooba Gillani from NUST Placement Office (NPO) have been conferred Tamgha-e-Imtiaz. The awards have been bestowed in recognition of their exceptional contributions to higher education, research and public service.

On behalf of NUST, Engr Javed Mahmood Bukhari, Rector NUST, extended heartiest felicitations to the excelling faculty and staff members, and expressed deep gratitude for their outstanding services to NUST and the nation at large. Describing the award recipients as role models for present and future generations of scholars, scientists and change makers, he underscored that NUST’s esteemed reputation is largely built upon the continuous efforts of its committed human resources, whom he termed the university’s greatest asset. He affirmed that NUST is abundantly endowed with intellectually proficient and inventive minds, and hoped that they would continue living by their own legacy of excellence. Sharing their thoughts, the awardees thanked Rector and the NUST community for recognising their accomplishments, and attributed their success to the varsity for providing them with a supportive and facilitating environment.

Dr Umar Shahbaz (Pride of Performance) is currently serving as a Professor at NUST CoEME. He is also the Director of National Centre of Robotics & Automation. His major achievements include accreditation of Mechatronics Engineering as one of the first programmes under the Washington Accord (WA), which helped Pakistan Engineering Council become a signatory of WA; uplift of Robotics and Automation in the country; project fundraising of around PKR 585 million; development of Myo Prosthetic Upper Limb, which has been commercialised and is being widely used by patients; co-founder of two NUST approved spinoffs; author of 78 publications and so on.

Dr Faisal Shafait (Pride of Performance) is working as a Professor & Associate Dean of Faculty of Computing at NUST SEECS. He is a world-renowned scientist in the field of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning. He has acquired more than 20 research grants worth over PKR 240 million. His research findings have been published in 58 journal papers, with a cumulative Impact Factor of 236, and more than 140 conference papers in reputed peer-reviewed international conferences. He has an H-index of 54, and over 12,500 citations.

Dr Salman Raza Naqvi (Tamgha-e-Imtiaz) is on the faculty of NUST School of Chemical & Materials Engineering (SCME). He is a truly accomplished academician and leading scientist with 178 (SCI) impact factor papers with total citation of 4307 and H-index of 37 as per Scopus database and WoS-JCR in the country. He has the highest number of research publications and research grants in the field of Chemical Engineering in Pakistan. He has also served as the Director of National Science & Technology Park, Pakistan’s first S&T park.

Dr Usman Akram (Tamgha-e-Imtiaz) is currently serving at CEME. He is the Founder and Director of BIOMedical Image and Signal Analysis. He has over 300 international publications with an accumulated impact factor of 250+. To date, he has completed over PKR 100 million industrial and research projects and has secured 2 international and 5 national IPs. He is also the recipient of Better World Project Award 2022 from Association of University Technology Managers, DC, Washington USA, and Salim-uz-Zaman Siddiqui Prize in Applied Science-Technology (2021) in Engineering Sciences for Scientists under 40 by Pakistan Academy of Sciences.

Dr Haider Abbas (Tamgha-e-Imtiaz) is a leading Cyber Security expert at NUST MCS and is one of the leading academic figures in Pakistan. He has secured research grants of over PKR 300M, authored over 200 scientific research articles and book chapters (with cumulative Impact Factor 500+). He is also serving as a Technical Editor for many top journals published by the IEEE, Springer and Elsevier. The Prime Minster of Pakistan has recently appointed him to lead the very significant initiative of Cyber Security for Digital Pakistan.

Ms Arooba Gilani (Tamgha-e-Imtiaz) is currently serving as GM Placements at NUST. She has made great efforts towards galvanising the youth into achieving their full potential. The highlight of her contributions is the establishment of Japan Centre at NUST, which is aimed at employing young professionals from Pakistan to work in Japan.