• Protesters enter admin block, chant slogans outside VC office
• Campus witnessing agitation for past several days over increase in tuition, late fees and lack of point buses

KARACHI: Students’ protest at the University of Karachi, going on for the past four days, got intense on Wednesday when a large number of students entered the admin block and chanted slogans in front of the vice chancellor’s office while Rangers remained present outside the building.

The protests are being held mainly against constant increase in tuition and late fees, deteriorated condition of university buses/points, poor security on the campus and its crumbling infrastructure.

“The university is constantly increasing the semester fee. Recently semester fee has been increased by 30 per cent and the semester fee’s 50 per cent has been imposed as late fee. We can’t pay that much. Now there is also re-admission fee. That is why we are protesting,” said one of the students.

“Then there is the issue of point buses. For over 45,000 students of the university, there are only 27 functional points. And even those buses are in deteriorated condition. One bus suddenly caught fire yesterday. Students could have been hurt due to that. But the administration doesn’t care at all,” he added.

A female student from the Criminology department said the university was increasing fee of even those students who had got enrolled before the fee hike.

Besides, the students also complained of poor security condition on the campus.

They expressed their concerns that there had been various instances of theft inside the university. But because the number of security staff is too less than what is required, nobody is there to ensure safety of students and the campus.

Meanwhile, due the students protest on the KU roads, point buses were also blocked, after which the VC ordered to cancel the operation of the buses.

Lamenting over the stoppage of buses, a student said, “The VC has ordered the buses to stop operating, leaving us on our own. The students were protesting in front of the buses upon which the VC took the decision and suspended the whole operation. I have to go to FTC area and now that the buses are not running, I’ll have to get home by changing three buses and pay fare three times.”

A female student said, “Me and my friends are going to sit here until the points are ordered to ply again. We don’t have any other transport facility for us.”

A press release issued by the Students Alliance asked the university administration to accept their demands such as reduction in fees, end to late fee, provision of proper transport facilities and campus security among other related demands.

They say that if their demands were not met, they would be forced to shut down the university road and other important routes. And if the demands were not resolved, the scope of the protest would be expanded, they warned.

Towards the evening, they said, the VC agreed to listen to them but as they put their demands before him, he refused to accept their key demands.

Later at night, there were reports that some students were still present outside the VC’s office, waiting to be heard. However, by 8pm, the students also left.

Published in Dawn, October 17th, 2024