ONCE a Roman general is said to have brought peace to a rebellious society by killing all its citizens. His fellow Romans were shocked and one of them wrote: “They create desolation and then call it peace”.

This is how the government seems to be fulfilling its promise of establishing a university in my hometown, Hafizabad. Last year, the government announced the establishment of the University of Hafizabad and the prime minister formally attended the ground-breaking ceremony where he was briefed about the feasibility plan, the allocated land and such other details.

However, now the government has decided to do something entirely different, which is bound to have serious consequences. The city has three colleges; two for girls and one for boys. These colleges have more than 5,000 students on their rolls annually for intermediate, and 2,300 for the graduation programmes.

Now, after formally inaugurating the University of Hafizabad, the government has decided to merge all the three colleges mentioned above to establish an ‘institute of arts and sciences’ and place it under the University of Faisalabad.

The said move will have negative consequences. The planned institution will accommodate only a few students for each discipline under the semester system. The city will be deprived of having any college, and hundreds of students will not be able to pursue their studies. And overall educational expenses will be unaffordable and beyond the common man’s reach.

Besides, the said colleges are already running BS programmes in different subjects. An institution replacing these colleges will only decrease the number of seats for students and maximise the cost of the same discipline for middle class families. Will somebody take up the matter and see what is going on and why?

Sajjad Saeed Awan
Lahore

Published in Dawn, March 23rd, 2021