Education activity severely affected in violence-hit areas

Karachi:July’s violence in Karachi has greatly affected the education of those living in the affected areas, as a social worker claimed that around 30,000 students in Kati Pahari and adjoining areas have stopped going to schools.

Addressing a press conference at Karachi Press Club on Saturday, an activist Abdul Waheed Khan said that in the backdrop of the violent situation, thousands of children and around 700 teachers have stopped going to schools. “Moreover, teachers are being stopped from performing their duties owing to their ethnic backgrounds. Why is education being targeted?” he said with tears in his eyes.

On the occasion, Concerned Citizens Forum (CCF), comprising around 65 NGOs, presented their five-point demands to the President and the Prime Minister. Karamat Ali of PILER read out the demands that called for imposing permanent ban on strikes, restricting the rallies of political parties to specific areas barring major thoroughfares, imposing ban on display of weapons by political workers who should not resort to violence and declaring wall chalking inciting hatred as illegal, besides all political parties should be required to identify miscreants in their folds and take appropriate action against them.

Tasneem Siddiqui from the CCF core committee said: “It is unfortunate that those who are in power are either killing others or becoming victims themselves, as the killing of 360 people in July is an alarming situation that has surpassed the situation in volatile countries like Iraq and Afghanistan”.

President Karachi Bar Association Muhammad Aqil said that 11 lawyers had been targeted since the beginning of the year, with four falling victims to targeted killing in July alone. “Every killing is condemnable and every citizen is asking today where the government is,” he said.

Dr Shershah Syed lambasted the government, saying this regime was solely responsible for the ongoing violence in the city. “If the government wants to restore law and order in Karachi, it can easily do so and only regime has to be blamed for all the murders and killings taking place in the city,” he added

Samrina Hashmi of Pakistan Medical Association said that the current situation was leading to the brain drain of doctors and businessmen as a number of them have already moved abroad.

“The doctors we train for years are packing up their bags and leaving the country and this situation requires the government to enforce its writ.” She called for doing away with political interference at hospitals and said that pictures of leaders should be removed from there.

Nargis Rehman said that concrete efforts have to be made to save the country, adding, the civil society was embarking on “Karachi ko bachao” campaign.

Eminent writer Fatima Surayya Bajia pledged to fight against the “clever” people who were out to destroy the peace of the city. She recalled the riots in Aligarh Colony where she saw the human bodies hanging in the area.

Faheem Zaman of the Citizens for Democracy warned that if political parties did not mend their ways then the people would ultimately lose hope in democracy and look for other options.The news.