LAHORE: A number of students of various public and private universities on Friday protested outside the Governor House to demand cancellation of physical examination.

The students were protesting last week and demanding cancellation of examination. The students gathered outside the press club and later marched on Governor House on The Mall and blocked the road for traffic.

The protesting students said the universities had conducted online classes due to closure of educational institutes because of the coronavirus pandemic. They said the universities also had not completed the syllabus of their different courses but now the institute’s administrations were pressing for exams.

They said the institutes had closed their hostels and the students of other cities did not have any place to live and how could they prepare and appear in examinations.While commenting on the fee issues, the students said the private institutes had charged thousands of rupees as fee and had not completed the syllabus. They demanded that the universities should be stopped from charging further fee and they did not have capacity to pay it.

A number of officials from the Governor House approached the students and requested them to end the protest as their demands would be presented before Governor Chaudhry Muhammad Sarwar. The students later handed over their demands to the Governor House employees on their assurance to cancel the physical examinations.

Earlier, a heavy police contingent reached and threatened the students to end the protest otherwise cases under terrorism charges would be registered against them.

Published in Dawn, January 23rd, 2021