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All over the world, education is realized as a driver for sustainable growth and productivity. The only way to accomplish that productivity and sustainability is to not only to enable humans to secure an education but to produce human capital. Pakistan is a signatory to many international treaties and conventions which reiterate the need to accomplish sustainable development goals by providing equal rights of education accessibility to all - men, women and/or the people of other genders. This qualitative study sought to investigate the role of Allama Iqbal Open University (a distance learning institution) in the accomplishment of the desired targets. For this purpose, a thematic analysis was conducted which followed Braun and Clarke’s 6-step thematic analysis (2006). It sought to probe how far this institution had progressed in achieving the purpose to provide students with academic and practical knowledge, while enhancing students’ capabilities through SMART (S stands for selfdirected, M for motivated, A for adaptive, R for resources and T for Technology) education to turn them into successful professionals & productive citizens. In order to achieve this, primary and secondary sources were used. It suggests that there is a great need to upgrade and revise the past educational system for educating students’ vis–a-vis formulation of new policies which relate to sustainable development in order to realize the smart education vision in future. Aqleem Fatimah is a Lecturer at Gender at Women Studies Department, Allama Iqbal Open University, H-8 Islamabad.