KARACHI: Students from Japan to visit KU next year
By Our Staff Reporter
KARACHI, Sept 13: The yearly visit of students from a Japanese university to the University of Karachi for a short duration study of Urdu is likely to resume next year, after a gap of one year.
A source privy to the KU administration said that under an agreement with the Daito Bunka University (DBU), Japan, students were to come to the University of Karachi, during their summer vacations, to learn Urdu language this year as well, which could not get materialized due to some “ill-advised correspondence initiated by a former chairman of the Urdu department”.
It was learnt that in view of the correspondence between the former chairman and authorities at the DBU, the vice-chancellor of Karachi University had asked the former to explain his position, added the source, saying that other measures leading to any disciplinary actions against the senior teacher could also be taken.
Under the agreement between the two varsities, Japanese students, who were already enrolled for Urdu language and Pakistan Studies classes in their university, had been spending their summer vacations at the Karachi University for learning Urdu and get familiar with the Pakistani culture and literature for the last many years.
In reply to a letter, the chairman of Committee of International Exchange, Faculty of IR, DBU, informed the KU dean of Arts that his university did not intend to abolish the present agreement of cooperation, and would like to send its students to the Karachi University next year so long as the classes of Urdu would be held in the campus of the university.
Referring to the cancellation of 2005 summer visit of the Japanese students, the chairman of International exchange said that there appeared to be some misunderstanding between the KU and the DBU.
Referring to an e-mail from the former chairman of the KU’s Urdu department dated June 22, 2005, he said that as a matter of law and university administration, they could not send their students to another university or its campus, with which they had not concluded any agreement of cooperation.
It was learnt that despite receiving a revised visit itinerary from Japan, the former chairman in question informed the DBU authorities on June 22 that he was trying to make a schedule for teaching and social and cultural programmes for the visiting students, but at the same time he was facing some administrative problems in getting necessary permissions and move onward as he had been in the past.
Talking to Dawn, the dean of KU arts faculty, Dr Mohammad Shamsuddin, said that the senior teacher kept him in dark about the correspondence he made with the Japanese university and upon inquiries always pretended that things were not positive from the other side.
Against all norms and requirements, the teacher had suggested the name of a private university. In the light of e-mails exchanged between the two quarters in question, copies of which had been received from the DBU in reply to my letter, it can be said that the Urdu department teacher wanted to get the Japanese friends engaged with a private university in the city, added the Arts dean.
According to sources, the former chairman had also informed the Japanese friends that he had already talked to the quarters at the helm of affairs of the private varsity on the matter of visit and they were ready to receive their students.
The chairman had also assured the DBU authorities that all the arrangements of teaching and other programmes would be supervised by him. However, the proposal for sending students of Urdu to a private university was turned down by the Faculty of IR, DBU, finally.
The dean of Arts said that had he been aware about the chairman’s inabilities and apprehensions and slant for another university the routine tour of Japanese students would have taken place this year as well.
It was learnt that upon a query the KU authorities were also furnishing explanation to the Prime Minister Secretariat on the cancellation of the visit. The Japanese students as finalized by the DBU were scheduled to depart from Tokyo on Aug 19 and arrive back to Tokyo from Pakistan on Sept 12 this year.
