Preston University singing competition

Preston University holds singing competition
Islamabad, Aug 15: The students enthralled the audience with their melodious songs in the Inter-university Singing Competition 2009 organised by the Preston University here.

The jam-packed hall of the university echoed with clapping and hooting by youngsters, who kept on applauding the amateur singers from different universities of the twin cities. The audience remained excited throughout the event.

There were three competitions held on the same day, namely the singing competition, dumb charade and a marketing competition titled 'Sell It'. The participating universities included the host university, National University of Modern Languages (Numl), Arid Agriculture University, Rawalpindi (AAUR), SKANS, Bahria University, Comsats and International Islamic University, Islamabad (IIUI).

The participants of the singing competition enthralled the audience with their excellent voice quality and complete grasp over the art of singing that was no less than that of a professional singer. A few of them such as Sahiba of AAUR, Iffat Shaheen of Preston University, Syed Bilal of Bahria University and Adnan Ahmed of Numl gave such a powerful performance that the audience at once accompanied them in singing.

Iffat Shaheen sung the beautiful ghazal of Faraz 'Mujh say pehli si mohabbat' without the help of any musical instrument so tremendously that she received a standing ovation from the audience.

The penal of judges for the singing competition included Nazia Hameed, Nauman Khalid and Kaleem A Barlas, who, in their remarks, thoroughly appreciated the participants, saying that they are the real future of the country. Ashir of Iqra University got the top honour in the singing competition while Iffat Shaheen of Preston University and Adnan Ahmed of Numl bagged the second and third positions respectively.

The dumb charade competition was unique and interesting, where one of the team partners was given some phrase or word and he had to act upon it only with actions and no words while his/her partners had to guess the right phrase or word. Preston University Kohat Campus was the only participating team in the competition; hence they were prized without any contest.

Later, the competition 'Sell It' was held to gauge the marketing skills of the students who were given some topics only a few minutes before the act and they had to come up with an advertisement of 45 seconds duration on their assigned topic. Preston University Islamabad Campus got the first prize in this competition while IIUI came second and SKANS got the third position.

Preston University Chancellor Dr Abdul Basit while addressing on the occasion said the varsity ever tries to explore the talent of its students in different creative fields and equally focuses on co-curricular activities. "We have tried to create a balance between the curricular and extra-curricular activities, which is a must for building the balanced personalities of the youth," he said.

Myra Imran adds: To acknowledge the role of media in the promotion of education in the country, Preston University arranged a dinner for media organisations as part of their ongoing activities to mark the institution's Silver Jubilee celebrations.

Representatives of print and electronic media organisations and eminent journalists attended the event. Parliamentary Secretary for Information & Broadcasting Azeem Doltana, the chief guest on the occasion, distributed shields among the media representatives.

Speaking on the occasion, Chancellor Preston University Dr Abdul Basit thanked the media for its continuous support and encouragement. "In the past 25 years, constant acknowledgment from media at every step forward was the major motivating force for the staff and students of Preston University," he said.

The chancellor appreciated the media for bringing a change in the public mindset through its extensive coverage of social issues, adding that it has played an important role in the development of higher education in the private sector.

"This dinner is aimed at acknowledging the cooperation the media organisations extended during this long journey of developing a small institute into an 'A' grade university." He said the journey is not yet over, as the university is committed to continue providing the highest quality education to the country's youth. "It is our mission to develop trained and educated human resource that can contribute in the development of the country."

Preston University is celebrating 25 years of its dedicated services to the country. Starting with only five students in the year 1984, the university today has a large network of campuses in the country with the total enrolment exceeding 8,000 students. The news

Source : www.interface.edu.pk