UAE confers Soft Diplomacy Award on Saylani Trust founder

Maulana Bashir Farooqui Qadri, the founder and chairman of Saylani Welfare International Trust, has been honoured with the Soft Diplomacy Award by the United Arab Emirates.

This accolade recognises Maulana Bashir Farooqui’s exceptional contribution to strengthening relations between the UAE and Pakistan.

The award was presented at a ceremony celebrating Pakistan’s Independence Day at the UAE Consulate General in Karachi.

Addressing the gathering, UAE Consul General in Karachi Bakheet Ateeq Al-Rumaithi highlighted the six decades of fraternal relations between Pakistan and the UAE, noting the pivotal role played by Pakistanis in the development of the UAE.

He emphasised that the friendship between the two nations would endure for a lifetime. The ceremony also featured a special message from the UAE’s minister for interfaith harmony, in line with Pakistan’s Independence Day celebrations.

Notably, individuals from various sectors, including health, education, sports, journalism, climate change, aviation, and culture, were also awarded certificates of appreciation for their contributions.

Meanwhile, the Saylani Trust chairman said that it aimed to produce a total of 10 million properly skilled graduates having the capability to earn $1 billion annually to mitigate Pakistan’s economic hardships.

He was speaking at the groundbreaking of the Saylani School of Emerging Sciences and Skills Education in the Naya Nazimabad area for producing graduates trained in IT and different technical trades for the international market.

Maulana Farooqui said the Saylani Trust had been massively contributing to augmenting Pakistan’s foreign exchange reserves by producing hundreds of thousands of graduates of its mass IT training programme who had been earning in dollars through freelancing.

Speaking on the occasion, renowned businessman Arif Habib said that a 500-bed hospital had been under construction in Naya Nazimabad. He said the foundation of the upcoming Education City project in Naya Nazimabad had been laid. The project will comprise a college and a university that will soon be constructed.