KARACHI, Sept 17: Academic activities at the Gulshan campus of the Federal Urdu University of Arts, Science and Technology (FUUAST) were once again disrupted when armed men belonging to a student group opened fire at the campus’s main gate on Monday afternoon.
The academic activities at the university came to a halt on Friday (Sept 13) in the aftermath of an attack on a minibus which left seven people, including four students of the University of Karachi, dead.
According to officials, prior to the incident at the Urdu university, some armed men had also fired into the air near the Sir Syed University of Engineering and Technology (SSUET), causing the university administration to announce the closure of the campus for Tuesday.
The FUUAST vice-chancellor in-charge, Dr Kamaluddin, told Dawn that the Gulshan campus would be reopened only after a review of the situation.
The university officials, however, believed that none of the university students had been involved in the incident.
Officials at the Aziz Bhatti police station said that no arrests had been made in this regard and clarified that nobody had been injured in the incident.
KU classes
Classes at most of the departments of the University of Karachi remained suspended on Monday as a result of a three-day mourning call by the Islami Jamiat Talaba (IJT).
According to the IJT’s claims, four out of the seven victims of the tragic incident of the minibus attack belonged to the IJT.
An IJT spokesman said that the classes at university would remain suspended till Wednesday to mourn the killings of the students. He claimed that the KU teachers’ body had also extended its support to the mourning call.
Waseem Aftab, in-charge of the organizing committee of the APMSO, accused the IJT activists of misbehaving with some teachers and manhandling office-bearers of the employees association of the KU.
Khalid Mehmood Iraqi, student advisor and chief of the campus security, said that the campus remained calm on Monday and Quran Khwani and meetings were held at different departments to condole the deaths of KU students.
The victims included Imran Shahid (political science), Ghulam Siddique (library information), Atif Hussain Butt (Applied Chemistry) and Habibullah (Mass Communication).
Exams postponed
The KU controller of examinations announced the postponement of all the examinations scheduled for Sept 17 and 18 without citing any reason.
Besides, the KU also announced that the date for submitting examination forms of BA and BCom (external candidates) had been extended till Sept 22 without a late fee.
