ISLAMABAD, April 7: The Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) will move a privilege motion against the vice chancellor of Quaid-i-Azam University (QAU) and its teachers for “allowing” students to participate in demonstrations against the party outside the Parliament House on the domestic violence bill issue during the past two days.

“We will ask the vice chancellor to explain before the committee as to how the students of his university came out of the campus to participate in protests during the time of their study. We will also move the motion against the participating students and call their parents for an explanation,” a JUI-F spokesman told Dawn on Saturday.

The spokesman, who is associated with Maulana Abdul Ghafoor Haideri, claimed that his party members had talked to some of the QAU students who told them that they had been forcefully brought to the protest by their teacher who happened to be an activist of a civil society organization (CSO).

He said the VC would be asked what action he had taken against the teacher, a government servant, for taking part in political activities and that too during the time of duty.

The Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam-Fazl spokesman alleged that some of the students had told them that Dr Farzana Bari, a QAU teacher, had forced them to take part in protests and threatened that she would not give them marks in the examination if they did not obey her.

On the other hand, when contacted, Dr Farzana Bari rejected the JUI-F’s allegations and said she had not forced any student to participate in any demonstration, and if they had done so, it was their own decision. She, however, said her students usually took parts in social activities and there had been no bar on it.

Dr Bari said she was ready to face the privilege motion, if moved by the JUI-F members.

When contacted, QAU Vice Chancellor Masoom Yasinzai said Dr Farzana Bari was the head of the Centre of Excellence in Gender Studies which was an autonomous body.

According to him, the centre was established in 2004 and it is being funded by the government of Pakistan through Higher Education Commission.

The VC further said there was no policy in the university under which the students could be prevented from going outside the campus during their study time as they were in postgraduate programmes. He, however, said he personally believed that what the students had done outside the Parliament House was improper.

Dozens of civil society activists and Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam-Fazl workers on Friday narrowly escaped a scuffle in front of Parliament House over delay in the passage of domestic violence bill.

It had all started on Thursday night when after opposing the bill on the floor of the joint sitting of the parliament, Maulana Fazlur Rehman came out of the Parliament House and had to steer through slogan-chanting protesters, mostly women activists, while going to his official residence.

The Maulana took the protest as his “humiliation” and as a reaction, opposed the participation of the civil society representatives in a meeting on Friday that had been called to consider the reservations of the opposition parties over the bill.

Dr Farzana Bari alleged that “MNA Attiya Inayatullah had told me that since we chanted slogans against Maulana, he was angry and would not allow the bill to pass”.

The JUI-F spokesman said the CSO activists had “humiliated” the party chief and their workers were angry over it.

He said the Maulana had also raised the matter with President Zardari when he called Maulana Fazlur Rehman on Saturday.