Teaching fraternity pays tribute to slain professor

Dr Waheedur Rehman, commonly known as Dr Yasir Rizvi, was killed two years ago

Dr Waheedur Rehman, commonly known as Dr Yasir Rizvi, was a champion of harmony and unity among different factions of society and remained a supporting hand for victims of discrimination and neglect, said Dr Shakeel Farooqi, the president of Karachi University Teachers' Society (Kuts) in a statement issued on the second death anniversary of the slain professor.

Unidentified men riding a motorcycle fired four shots at Dr Rehman in Karachi’s Federal B Area in April 2015. Rehman received bullet wounds in the face, head and chest. The 42-year-old professor was in his Suzuki Cultus in Block 16 of Federal B Area when he was gunned down.

Dr Farooqi lamented over failure of the government in bringing Dr Rehman’s murderers to justice. He said that even two years after his assassination, the Sindh government could not deliver the compensation to his family as promised.



The Kuts president said it is cheaper for the government when a university teacher is killed in Sindh as compared to any other province in the country. It costs less to the tax payer, he added.

Dr Farooqi went on to remember the various slain teachers, naming Dr Basheer A Channar of Sindh University who was murdered in 2012, Dr Shakeel Auj of Karachi University who was murdered in 2014 and Dr Waheedur Rahman of Karachi University who was murdered in 2015. He added that the families of these slain teachers remain deprived of any compensation from the Sindh government. On the contrary, said Dr Farooqi, the provincial governments of Punjab and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa have awarded compensation, amounting to as much as Rs5 million to Rs7 million, to the aggrieved families of professors killed in their provinces.

According to the Kuts president who is also the secretary-general of Federation of All Pakistan Universities Academic Staff Association’s (Fapuasa) Sindh chapter, the teaching fraternity all through Sindh is still waiting to see the murderers meeting their fate before it gets too late.



Moreover, he stressed, the way higher education institutions and the teaching community are being treated in Sindh has to be changed. He added that the Sindh government must stop playing politics with the universities. Dr Farooqi reiterated the demands that the families of slain professors must be compensated immediately and the murderers apprehended and brought to justice without any further delay.

Dr Farooqi announced that on Thursday (May 4), representatives from all the public-sector universities in Sindh are going to meet in Mehran University of Engineering and Technology, Jamshoro, to discuss their further plan of action to have their demands accepted.