Message from the Chancellor to the Chairman and members of the Board of Trustees on the occasion of the conferment of an Honorary Doctorate on Sahabzada Yaqub-Khan at the November 3, 2001 Convocation.

Addressed to:

Mr. Saidullah Khan Dehlavi
Chairman, Board of Trustees
Aga Khan University

An honorary doctorate is the highest level of recognition that Aga Khan University can bestow upon any individual. For this reason, AKU has awarded such degrees with great respect, but also care and circumspection. Indeed, AKU has only awarded three such degrees in the past 18 years.

I am particularly happy that AKU has decided to recognize, with the highest honour it can award Sahabzada Yaqub-Khan, the University’s first chairman of its Board of Trustees, who for the last sixteen years has brought to the Board, the apex governing body of our institution, his outstanding leadership.

It has been a great joy and privilege to benefit from Sahabzada Yaqub-Khan’s exceptional intellect, his skills of diplomacy, and his wise counsel. As Chairman of our University since 1985, Sahabzada Yaqub-Khan has played a vital role in guiding the Institution through its early days, overcoming numerous challenges, and establishing it on a sound basis whereby it is now making a meaningful contribution to the development of Pakistan, the Ummah and other areas of our world.

Indeed, to commemorate Sahabzada’s outstanding contribution as the founding chairman, I am happy to announce that I have established an endowment to support the appointment of the Sahabzada Yaqub-Khan professorship in Philosophy. This position will be in Aga Khan University’s new College of Arts and Sciences, that is currently being developed.

It is my great pleasure wholeheartedly to endorse the award of the degree of Doctor of Letters to an outstanding leader of Aga Khan University, Sahabzada Yaqub-Khan. His career of service to this country and to this University is a model for all who have been, are, or will, in the future, be associated with this Institution.