I APPRECIATE Ahsan Kamal’s article ‘Politics on campus’ (May 26) for logically approaching the thorny issue of campus politics. He is very right when he says that the growing incidence of violence on the campus is not a product of political activity but of criminal and violent influences who dominate the campus to counter threat political participation can best counter the threat of violence.

History, even of the Pakistan movement, shows that student politics has been a traditional source of providing resources to the ordinary students for greater social mobility and personal, professional and national development. I also agree that preventing students from politics may bring short-term gains but long-term pains will follow.

In this backdrop, campus politics in Pakistan needs to be transformed from its existing purposelessness and violent form to a meaningful and socially desirable activism to bring an end to exploitive passivism of the powers that be.

The importance of transformational campus politics has been aptly emphasised by Iqbal Haider in his study titled ‘Revisiting student politics in Pakistan’ (2009).

Building a case for fundamental transition in student politics from a developmental perspective by virtue of growing convergence of student politics with emerging governance issues pertaining to the universities and education administration, the author very candidly suggests that an inclusive regulatory mechanism for the student politics would do for transparent and accountable university system, not just the restrictive government orders.

Because campus activism, which is synonymous with political activism, seeks to and believes in working with others to influence societal institutions, it has the potential to bring about a paradigm shift in student politics.

Going by Mr Kamal’s prescription, let there come a pledge followed by a sincere effort from all stakeholders, i.e. students, student organisations, political parties, researchers, civil society practitioners and public interest leaders, university administrators, education planners, policymakers and government functionaries to counter the threat of violence by increasing political participation and collective decision-making, a sine qua non for violence-free campus politics indeed.

MUHAMMAD SHAHID DAYO Islamabad

Hooliganism

SHAHBAZ Sharif likes to present himself as a knowledge-loving chief minister. Spending billions of rupees on establishing Daanish schools and distributing free laptops are some proof of his love for knowledge.

Although planning could have been better, one cannot deny the benefits of the steps taken. However, there are issues in the academic world which cannot be ignored.

For example, the condition of government-run educational institutions is deteriorating day by day. One reason for this is hooliganism by political elements. These hooligans only want their superiority and power to create obstacles in academic activities, break law, beat teachers, use foul language against them and illegally occupy hostel rooms.

The country’s biggest and oldest educational institution, Punjab University, is one example where these goons have wreaked havoc.

The knowledge-loving chief minister needs to take concrete steps to stop hooliganism at the university.

The chief minister should use his authority to eliminate these elements from educational institutions. If he does not save educational institutions from these goons, people may think that most of what he is doing is to gain maximum votes in the forthcoming elections.

MOHAMMAD ARSALAN Karachi