THE student community’s show of power seemed unstoppable. After the acceptance of demands of the students of Dawood College of Engineering and Technology — as was mentioned in the previous column — it was the turn of the young ones studying at another institute to show what they were capable of. On Jan 17, 1972 the students of Sindh Muslim Arts and Commerce College encircled their principal’s Jinnah Court residence to press for their demands — which included exemption of December fee (as the college remained closed because of the war) and utilisation of union funds by the students themselves. They kept shouting slogans outside his house. Subsequently, a deputation met with the principal (Prof A S Kohati) to discuss their problems. The professor told Dawn he would place the demands of exemption of tuition fee for the month of December before the governing body because the principal had no powers to decide on such issues on his own.

The next day, Jan 18, two groups of students of S M Arts and Commerce College and S M Science College clashed for well over two hours pelting stones at each other. The main reason for the fight was that the ones belonging to the arts section walked out of their classes and marched to the science section urging the boys there to boycott the classes in order to join them in their protest. The science students resented what they called the ‘breach of contract’ between the arts students and the college administration. The arguments ended in a free for all.

And in a bit of a similar vein, on Jan 19 the East Pakistan Students Union protested against the decision of the Karachi University to charge all dues except tuition fee at the time of admission from the East Pakistani students who had been rendered destitute. In a resolution adopted at a meeting they appealed to the university authorities to exempt them from all charges as they were not in a position to pay any amount.

On the city’s administrative front, the authorities were still trying to figure out who needed to do what. On Jan 17, it was reported that a bench of the Sindh-Balochistan High Court had heard arguments in connection with a petition challenging the right of the Karachi Development Authority (KDA) to levy water tax in North Nazimabad. The dispute arose after four petitions were filed by the residents of North Nazimabad. Arguing the point, the counsel for petitioners Z H Lari said it was the Karachi Municipal Corporation (KMC) alone which supplied and realised water charges in the area since it was its jurisdiction. The court was to hear the defence counsel a few days later.

What was the corporation up to at the time? On Jan 22, it was announced that the KMC was undertaking a general review of its maintenance and capital works programme in light of the government’s general advice given to various departments and agencies to curtail their non-development expenditure up to 30 per cent. Apart from exercising maximum economy in the routine expenses such as purchase of stationary, furniture, entertainment and travelling etc, the KMC was identifying works which could be deferred until next year.

Published in Dawn, January 17th, 2022