Dr Tauseef Aized With the advent of the industrial revolution, the conventional role of universities has been transformed from merely educating young people to creating and disseminating knowledge to the whole society. Every higher education institution needs enormous financial resources which are typically provided through public funding in our country. The state demands a return on its investment beyond traditional manpower development. Thus, universities bear the responsibility of interacting with the entire society to demonstrate positive gains. A university can reap large gains by establishing an industrial liaison; one of the most important being an exposure to the realities of practical problems. Such liaisons, which are a win-win prospect for universities and industries, are common in developed countries but are non-existent in our society. Currently, public sector universities in Pakistan get reasonable levels of state funding, but this state of affairs will not last forever. The time is approaching when these institutions will face pressure to generate their own funding beyond the usual increase of the fees charged to students. Under these demanding circumstances, the only recourse for our universities will be industrial funding, especially in the pure and applied sciences. By developing workable industrial linkages, the universities cannot only raise requisite finances, but also can acquire a great deal of skill and knowledge. This is probably the best way to contribute towards society as well. Our higher education policy-makers and university managers must begin to play outside of the stereotypical classrooms where only rudimentary problems are discussed. The country is facing gigantic challenges in every sphere of life and intellectuals and scholars, especially those serving in the universities as faculty, must lend their hands in order to improve the deteriorated and troubled situation. The modus operandi for establishing a university-industry liaison should be framed by universities and they should not wait for industries and other related organisations to initiate such relationships. The very first step to achieve this goal is the development of specialised skill groups inside universities. These groups must work, in their own areas of interest, to thoroughly understand industrial problems and propose solutions. In addition, every institution must chalk out its own areas of interests, for which it would strive to gain expertise and excellence because in the absence of truly credible expertise, no industrial linkage is possible. Furthermore, the higher education institutions must initiate aggressive campaigns for the development of industrial linkages. The universities must be willing to work and solve practical problems, even without any grants from industries, to gain the confidence of industrial collaborators by delivering good results. This is the key to successful industrial collaborations. Almost every university in Pakistan requires its undergraduate and graduate students to carry out some assignment as final term projects. In majority of the cases, these projects are meaningless because the students, (in most cases) with the aid of faculty, copy or repeat something that has already been done. This practice must be discouraged and the concept and scope of the projects must be inline with the needs of the society. If universities are successful in revitalising these project assignments, it would be a great step towards creating knowledge and expertise, which can be disseminated for the welfare of society. The universities should develop and conduct industry-related short- and medium-term courses because such courses will greatly attract industrial staff. These courses can generate money and form a good platform for initiating and developing long-term industrial collaborations. The selection of these courses should be dictated by the requirements of industry around the academic institution. For instance, an institution based in Faisalabad should consider organising a short course focused on the textile industry as there is a lot of related industrial activity there. The universities must also consider establishing spin-off organisations within the premises of the universities, which can serve as platforms for interactions between industry and higher education. Many universities in the world develop prototype products through projects, and successfully market their expertise. This should serve as a model for our institutions, the expertise and project management skills required to conduct these projects can be developed either locally or can be acquired through foreign linkages. The concept of science and technology parks has matured in the developed world and the time has come when we should plan and work vigorously for developing such facilities if we wish to keep abreast of the modern world. In the end, industrial sector must also comprehend the benefits of university liaisons. Every industry faces a lot of diversified technical and managerial problems which can be solved through their interaction with higher education and research institutions. The industries should neither consider it a waste of time and resources nor take this activity as a 'charity'. Industry needs to realise that the industry-university interactions are equally beneficial for both the industry and the academia as they result in higher productivity and improved quality of industrial products and services. The writer is a professor at the University of Engineering and Technology (UET), Lahore and a research fellow at Monash University, Melbourne, Australia