After the infamous thrashing incident in an army-run university a year ago, a professor of the Pakistan Navy-run Bahria University has not only been roughed up but also terminated from service.
His guilt: Asking questions about the regimental-style running of the university which has the Naval Chief as its pro-chancellor and a retired admiral as rector. When the professor signed a receipt on the register confirming his termination, sent through a peon, he wrote the famous verse of Habib Jalib: “Main nahi manta...”
The brutality and humiliation of Professor Qamar Riaz Mahmitkhel, who teaches ‘leadership’, sent the already weary students of the university into fury and a protest demonstration is planned on Monday noon outside the Naval Headquarters at Shaheen Chowk, situated at Margalla Road.
An immediate reaction of the Bahria University administration to the sacking of the professor was not immediately available, but the protest demonstration of the students on Monday will show how the officials react.
The incident occurred on March 31 in the packed auditorium of the university where chairman of Higher Education Commission (HEC) Dr Javed Leghari delivered a talk followed by a Q&A session.
As Professor Qamar asked what the real purpose of the university and that whether the innovation and creativity could flourish in a regimental environment, it was the breaking point that landed him in trouble. The students had greeted the question with round of applause, said a participant.
The question was addressed to the HEC chairman, but the Rector, Vice Admiral (R) Muhammad Haroon, stood up to answer. Professor Qamar went on blasting the university’s administration for reducing the campus to a garrison.
A commando action followed this rumpus when the director campus of the university, a retired commodore Muhammad Ali, led his team and surrounded the blunt professor, forcing him out, roughing up on resistance, the victim told. He was thrown into his office, declaring it a kind of sub-jail as three staffers, presumably intelligence persons, were posted as guards outside to scrutinize visitors of the professors, Prof Qamar said.
The next day, April 1, Professor came to the university with his hands-cuffed and his mouth gagged. He made a round of the campus especially the auditorium where he was roughed up. The purpose of the exercise was to protest the frustrating environment where nobody is allowed to speak freely, including the academicians, he said.
He was delivered a termination letter in the next couple of hours after the protest and through a peon instead of routing it through the head of the department. As he was asked to receive the letter, he instead wrote the famous verse “main nahi manta....” of Habib Jalib.
The professor said he had been receiving threatening calls urging him observe silence instead of speaking out against the university’s administration. But he is determined to attend the protest being organised by the student community today (Monday) in front of the Naval Headquarters at Shaheen Chowk.
This incident is a second of its nature in armed forces-run universities and within Islamabad as previously a civilian professor, Tahir Malik of NUML was thrashed by a brigadier-registrar of the university. The students had then went on strike for a week, finally forcing the NUML administration to remove the brigadier.
