Project playground.

Seemeen Ikramullah is concerned about the state of education in Pakistan today. `So many still have no education at all,' she says. So she initiated a project in her city `to help create an awareness of the importance of education in our country'.

Ikramullah and her husband, editor of the The Muslim World and Assistant Secretary General of the World Muslim Congress, live in Karachi. Ikramullah became the leader of her local Rotary Club's community service committee. She decided to help the Association of Children with Emotional and Learning Problems (ACELP). The goal was to build a fully equipped playground for the children in the special school. Her committee found an architect who drew up the plans without charge and a contractor who agreed to level the ground at minimal cost. The last stage of the project is to provide a canvas covering over the playground so it can be used in all weathers.

Last year the group also provided uniforms, and hearing aids for the deaf children at the school. This year, as well as continuing to help ACELP, the Club is paying the salary of a teacher in a new school opening near one of the largest slum areas of the city.

As a member of the Federation of Business and Professional Women of Pakistan, of which she is Senior Vice-President for the East, Ikramullah has also fought poverty by helping purchase sewing machines for women who have no means of support. `One of my dreams is that we can begin to bridge the gap between the rich and the poor in Pakistan,' she says.