August 28, 2008	Thursday	Sha'aban 25, 1429

KARACHI, Aug 27: It was around 6.30 in the evening when the Karachi University campus reverberated with the sound of gunfire, which eventually resulted in the death of three students and injuries to many others.

Tuesday’s incident clearly indicates that arms have made a comeback on the campus since last time they were used freely in 1989 at the Arts Lobby in a clash between what was then the All Pakistan Muhajir Students Organisation (APMSO) and the People’s Students Federation following which Rangers were called in for assistance to maintain law and order.

Background interviews with some faculty members suggest that Tuesday’s incident was not an isolated one. Actually things had been simmering since Sept 14 last year, when a minibus was attacked in front of the university and in which nine people, most of them students, had been killed.

Sources on the campus said that unlike past years, the campus was not free from arms. In fact, small arms such as handguns had been brought onto the campus by the student organisations recently, they said.

It is not that a single student organisation is armed, but almost all student wings of political and religious parties have accumulated arms overt the years, campus sources said.

Tuesday’s incident is a clear security lapse as earlier in the day an activist of the APMSO was roughed up by members of the Islami Jamiat-i-Talaba. However, the groups were pacified by the student adviser. “Clearly some security enhancement should have been made by the security apparatus on the campus,” a faculty member said.

“If outsiders and arms and ammunition are coming onto the campus under the very nose of the Rangers, then what is the justification for their stay on the campus,” said another faulty member. As always, Rangers gave a muted response to Tuesday’s incident and detained innocent students following the killings.

The Sindh government posted the Rangers on the campus in 1989. Recently following an incident with Dr Riaz Ahmed, who was roughed up on the campus by Rangers personnel, the para-military force was asked by the university administration to withdraw to a certain extent, making only a symbolic presence at the gates.

Since then, the security staff of the watch and ward department of the university has come to fore, taking up the responsibilities at the three main gates of the campus.

Ironically, the Computer Science Department, where the firing took place, is situated just a few yards from the former hostel buildings where Rangers are stationed. However, not a single suspect was arrested by the Rangers and all the intruders carrying arms or the students who were inside the campus with arms escaped.

Only innocent students mostly of the evening shift were detained by the Rangers and handed over to the police. The students were finally released from the New Town police station around three in the morning following the verification of their credentials.

However, a visit to the campus on Tuesday showed that the Rangers had taken up positions at various points inside and at the gates of the university.

Inquires showed that there were 120 or so Rangers personnel posted at the NED and Karachi universities. Earlier, there was an entire wing stationed at Karachi University. However, some of the Rangers have been sent to the interior of Sindh.

Defending their role, a spokesman for the Rangers told Dawn that Tuesday’s incident was clearly a well-coordinated attack in which the suspects carried out their operation in two to three minutes.

Firing incidents broke out at various places simultaneously, and the Rangers as per their mandate were present at the gates and at some vintage points such as the Arts Lobby, the spokesman said.

Answering a question as to how arms had been taken onto the campus, the Rangers spokesman said there were several exit and entry points on the campus and at several places walls were broken.

However, the spokesman sought to shift their responsibility by saying that “We can’t man every building on the campus, and the university administration has its own security arrangements also.”

Tuesday’s killings on the campus would surly prove a catalyst for an extended stay of Rangers on the campus, a faculty member said.

On Sept 13 last year, nine persons, mostly students, were killed when nine suspects riding on three motorcycles attacked a minibus of Route G-7 on the main University Road opposite the Staff Town gate.

The suspects initially opened fire on the minibus using AK-14 rifles and later hurled some explosive device into the vehicle. Initially seven persons died, but later the death toll rose to nine. Largely members of the IJT were killed in the incident with some other passengers.

As far as investigation is concerned, a senior police officer said that “investigation is pending as no clue to the assailants was found”.

The driver of the minibus survived the attack and his statement was recorded by the police.