Punjab University (PU) teachers and employees protested outside the Punjab Assembly against the PU Vice Chancellor (VC) Professor Dr Mujahid Kamran. They alleged he was corrupt and demanded the termination of his term as VC. The protestors distributed pamphlets alleging the VC was corrupt while asserting their innocence among parliamentarians and citizens,.
Some PU teachers and employees, including PU Academic Staff Association (PUASA) President Maher Saeed Akhtar and former president Mumtaz Salik, under the supervision of PU Technical and Administrative Staff Association President Ghulam Abass Lodhi and Munir Awan, condemned the PU VC and demanded his arrest and termination.
Pamphlets distributed on the occasion claimed the PU VC had allegedly made about 450 illegal recruitments and had grafted billions, while destroying the academic environment of the university. Protestors demanded an honest professor at PU be appointed as VC.
Posters sported by the protestors claimed that the illegal appointments made by the VC had been proven by the standing committee of the Punjab Assembly, and the government ought to take action against the VC. A few students expelled from PU, backed by disgruntled elements of the faculty and the institute’s employees attempted to bring the Punjab University into disrepute by distributed pamphlets with malicious content outside the Punjab Assembly, and tried to misguide the hounourable assembly members.
According to a press release issued by the PU Teachers Front over the issue of these agitators, including Maher Saeed, Mumtaz Salik, Mumtaz Anwar, and notorious university employees Ghulam Abbas Lodhi and Munir Awan, it had been hoped that some of the members of assembly attending the session might show up in support of their cause, however, they were disappointed as they did not receive any attention from the lawmakers. It said these agitators, belonging to a political group, had always been found disrupting the academic atmosphere of the university – even their sons had been found involved in illegal activities in the past.
Thus, it seems that the protesters masked a disruptive and negative agenda beneath a veneer of altruism. All of them hide pasts steeped in unlawful and disorderly activities during their stay at the university. Following their expulsion due to disciplinary action taken against them for anti-social activities which disrupted the peaceful educational environment of the university, their focus has been found increasingly on trying to misuse their position for the attainment of unlawful objectives such as interference in the normal administration of the institution. These elements want their former nazim to be the top administrator of the university again and go against all administrative officials who do not act according to their illegal wishes. Their present agitation and disruptive activities are a direct result of the loss of their old so-called prestigious control over various activities of the university. Not only students, but the public and media have now also seen the dirty games played by such elements who are trying to pollute the peaceful academic environment for the attainment of their dirty ends.
During the past four-year tenure of the present university administration, rapid strides have been made in various fields of academics, bringing the ranking of the university to fourth in Pakistan. The overwhelming majority of students, employees and academia strongly feel that the unique progress made by the Punjab University under Kamran must be allowed continuity to attain the fruits of reform recently introduced in all spheres of this oldest and largest institution of Pakistan.
