KARACHI: Students risking their life every day in commuting to Karachi University (KU) might get some relief in coming days as eight new buses purchased by the university a year back were finally added to its transport fleet on Tuesday.

Sources said the buses were purchased last year in February under a project approved by the Higher Education Commission (HEC) in 2017. Their induction was delayed for want of registration and insurance.

According to university officials, this is the first time that buses were “purchased” by the university. Earlier, KU used to get buses in donation.

“Their induction was delayed due to lack of registration and insurance. We had been waiting for the release of funds which have now been made available by the university’s finance department,” Dr Qadeer Mohammad Ali, looking after the university’s transport, explained.

He agreed with concerns over a dilapidated transport system that endangers students’ life daily and said this new induction was absolutely insufficient.

“The current fleet only provides transport to six per cent of the students. I must say if successive university administrations had inducted only two to three new buses every year that wouldn’t have been a burden on the university’s resources, students would have received a better transport service today,” he said.

Dr Qadeer recalled that the university used to run 60 point buses for 15,000 students in the 1980s. “Even, the situation in the 1980s was better than today when we had 30 buses for 43,000 students. Unfortunately, successive administrations hadn’t given any consideration to this key need, though students’ number increased dramatically over the years,” he shared.

Meanwhile, the university administration held a ceremony on the campus to officially induct the buses. “I hope that with the addition of these new buses, the existing travel facilities will be further enhanced,” he said, while appreciating the transport department’s efforts in this regard.

Published in Dawn, January 18th, 2023