A simmering dispute between faculty members and the administration of the Federal Urdu University intensified on Thursday, forcing Vice Chancellor Professor Dr Zabta Khan Shinwari to leave the university's Science Campus amid dramatic scenes as protesting teachers demanded the payment of long-overdue salaries, pensions and other benefits.
The confrontation unfolded at the university's Gulshan-e-Iqbal Science Campus when faculty members surrounded the vice chancellor's vehicle as he attempted to leave the premises. In a striking act of protest, a faculty member, identified as Asghar Dashti, lay down in front of the vehicle, shouting demands for unpaid salaries and pensions. "Pay our salaries, pay our pensions. Our households are suffering and people are struggling to make ends meet," the protesting teacher was heard saying.
The protest follows days of demonstrations by faculty members from both university campuses, who had already boycotted ongoing examinations and established a protest camp outside the administrative block. The teachers are demanding the release of delayed salaries and pensions, payment of house ceiling benefits withheld for more than a year, reinstatement of dismissed faculty members and direct negotiations with the vice chancellor.
According to representatives of the teachers' association, the vice chancellor declined to engage directly with protesters. They alleged that after being confronted by faculty members, he initially attempted to leave the campus on foot before trying to depart in an auto-rickshaw. However, the rickshaw driver reportedly refused to continue after protesters surrounded the vehicle. Witnesses said the vice chancellor later crossed University Road through the ongoing Red Line project area and left on a motorcycle.
Following his departure, protesters briefly blocked University Road and staged a sit-in, causing traffic disruptions in the area. Faculty members also raised slogans demanding an apology from the vice chancellor to a female professor. According to Abdul Haq Campus Teachers Association Secretary Prof Iqbal Naqvi, the VC allegedly threatened Political Science Department Chairperson Prof Dr Rani Iram during a conversation earlier in the day. Naqvi said the faculty intended to file a harassment complaint regarding the incident. He added that teachers had repeatedly sought negotiations over salaries, pensions, house ceiling payments and medical benefits, while also demanding an apology to the professor.
