At a girls college in Kharadar, silence haunts

During working hours, a newly-constructed three-storey building stands deserted inside the vast Thathani Compound in Nanakwara near Light House.
The large rooms and some well-designed halls inside the building are vacant. A few people loiter around the main gate.
A notification on a wall along the entrance reads that students with an attendance below 75 percent will not be allowed to appear in examinations but where is everyone?
This is the Government Degree College for Women, Punjabi Club, Kharadar. But there is no principal, teacher, administrative staff or any student inside. Recently, the college was shifted from the troubled area of Lyari, which is reeling from bouts of violence from time to time, to its current location.
The ghost college has not held educational activities in the past two academic sessions.
Inside the campus, there are six classrooms and a laboratory on every floor of the three-storey building. A layer of dust covers the floor of classrooms and laboratories due to inactivity.
There are no fans or lights in most of the classrooms and no laboratory apparatus suggests everything may have been stolen a long time ago. Doors of some rooms are locked and it seems that they may never been opened since their construction.
The college is being run on provincial government’s official papers but the situation at the campus suggests otherwise. Even the Centralised Admission Policy (CAP) Committee had granted admissions to around 351 candidates in the girls’ degree college for the session 2011-12.
A clerk, who comes to the college twice a week, has warned the female students about the insecurity at the campus and advised them to ask the intermediate board for being transferred to a college for attending classes near their residence.
He informed them that they would be considered as students of the same college but given permission for attending classes at other colleges. He told the girls to come to the institution only to fill their examination appearance form and to collect their admit cards.
He also asked them to give him their contact numbers so that he could inform them when they will have to come to the college.
When asked if someone visits the educational institution, some people outside the college’s main gate told Pakistan Today that only an old lady and two other men visit the college sometimes but they had never seen any students at the college.
Situated in the narrow lanes leading to the MA Jinnah Road, the college also serves as a parking lot for the vehicles of office-goers during the day. A security guard runs a business of charged parking – on behalf of the provincial government – inside the campus in the absence of teaching staff and students. The guard has also encroached on two rooms at the entrance, enjoying free electricity and gas supply at the government’s expense.
During the night, the campus becomes a haven for criminals and drug addicts.
With recently-posted college principal Shahnaz Memon unavailable, Pakistan Today caught up with former principal of college, Parveen Luni.
Luni said that she had worked at the college for one year but as there were no students, teachers or any non-teaching staff, she requested the government to transfer her to some functional college.
“In 2010 [at the college], I was the only one who worked as the principal, teacher, clerk and even a security guard. There were nearly 100 enrolled students but once a month only two or three girls turned up to attend classes, as I could only teach one subject in absence of other faculty members,” the ex-principal said. “This year I was transferred and posted to another college.”
Talking to Pakistan Today, Sindh Colleges Director General Dr Nasir Ansar was of the view that there is no concept of education in the locality where the college is situated.
“The problem [with the college] is that it has low enrolment and is located in Nanakwara, Lyari Town. There is no teaching staff [at the college] as last year the government did not approve the Sanctioned Numbers of Employees (SNE) of this college due to which teachers are not ready to go to this college,” he said. “The SNE has been approved this year and the college staff would be recruited for restoration of academic activities.”
To a question, Ansar said the provision of staff at college and their transfers/postings came under the domain of Karachi Colleges Regional Director. However, when Najma Niaz – the authority concerned – was approached, she replied that the Sindh Colleges Director General was answerable as to why he had given admission to girls to a college where there is no faculty.
“Last year the government could not approve SNEs of colleges but the department has now decided to post Sindh Public Service Commission-qualified teachers,” she admitted.
Niaz also confirmed that currently a principal and two clerks are posted at the college. “Soon the faculty would be posted at the college and the provincial education department would also issue advertisements in newspapers for hiring non-teaching staff.”
Photos by Asim Rehmani