Pakistan is home to a lot of talent; many children of this nation have gone on to do great things and have made their mark around the globe. According to a survey led by United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), an overwhelming majority of young Pakistanis travel overseas for better opportunities mostly to the US, Europe and Australia. The survey revealed that most of the children and young men between 14 and 25 seeking opportunities belonged to Pakistan. They later settle down abroad due to lack of opportunities for them within the country, which leads to brain drain and needs immediate attention at government level. Last month Muhammad Shaheer Niazi’s research on electric honeycomb made headlines, and even BBC aired a special report about him stating that only 17 years old Pakistani is already a recognised scientist.
Muhammad Shaheer Niazi’s research on electric honeycomb was recently published in the Royal Society Open Science journal. Giving the details, the report stated: “The Physicists have known the phenomenon of electric honeycomb for decades. It occurs when a layer of oil is placed in an electric field between a pointy electrode and a flat one – and the instability caused by the build-up of ions applies pressure to the surface of the oil – creating a beautiful pattern that looks like a honeycomb, or a stained glass window. The high school student from Pakistan photographed the movement of ions that forms the honeycomb besides recording the heat found on the surface of oil. No one has done this before.” Electric honeycomb phenomenon was the problem given to him at the International Young Physicists’ Tournament held in Russia last year.
There was another young Pakistani girl Arfa Karim who made a history when at the age of 9 years became the youngest Microsoft Certified Professionals (MCPs) in the world, a title she kept until 2008. She was invited by Bill Gates to visit the Microsoft Headquarters in the US, the vice president of the Software Development Division, wrote about it in his blog. She also wrote a poem about Bill Gates. On returning to Pakistan, Arfa had numerous interviews on almost all of the country’s known television channels and newspapers. In August 2005, Arfa Karim received the Fatimah Jinnah Gold Medal in the field of Science and Technology, presented by the Prime Minister of Pakistan at that time. She also received the Salaam Pakistan Youth Award again in August 2005 by the President of Pakistan.
Arfa Karim was also the recipient of the President’s Award for Pride of Performance. This is a very high level civil award granted to people who have shown excellence in their respective fields over a long period of time. Arfa was once the youngest recipient of that award ever. Arfa Karim also represented Pakistan on various international fora; and she was invited by the IT Professionals of Dubai for a stay of two weeks in Dubai. A dinner reception was hosted for her there, which was attended by the diagnostics of Dubai including the Ambassador of Pakistan. During that trip, Arfa was presented with various medals and awards. In such a young age, she had become a legend.
In November 2006, Arfa was invited by Microsoft to be a part of the keynote session in the Tech-Ed Developers conference held in Barcelona. The theme of the conference was “Get ahead of the game” and Arfa was presented as a true specimen of being ahead of the game. She was the only Pakistani among over 5000 developers in that conference. As of 2011, at the age of 16, Arfa Karim was studying at Lahore Grammar School Paragon Campus in her second year of A Level. She suffered from cardiac arrest after an epileptic seizure on December 22, 2011 and was admitted to Lahore’s Combined Military Hospital (CMH) in critical condition. On January 14, 2012 at the age of 16 passed away at 9:50 PM at Combined Military Hospital (CMH) Lahore.
