In need: Students of UoP prove they’re friends indeed

“Thanks to my friends, I submitted the fee a day before the deadline expired," says Amin.

PESHAWAR:

An old proverb maintains when the student is ready, the teacher appears. But for a student at the University of Peshawar, friends ensured Saiful Amin also has the funds to continue financing his education.

Friends and acquaintances collected donations amounting to nearly Rs40,000 to prevent the student of MA Sociology from being expelled after he failed to pay the amount himself. They managed to collect the required sum by the deadline set by university authorities after months of running from pillar to post.

“Thanks to my friends, I submitted the fee a day before the deadline expired. Now I am safe for the rest of the academic year,” a grateful Amin told The Express Tribune. “Today I feel relaxed after three months because the hanging threat of expulsion is no longer there.”

He hails from Goldur village in Chitral and secured admission in the university’s sociology department a few months earlier under the self-finance scheme. “I am working at a pharmacy shop in Dhaki Munawaar Shah near Qissa Khawni Bazaar to finance my studies.”



Amin said he initially thought he could pay for his studies with his meagre salary of Rs5,000. However, he quickly realised it was next to impossible to pay for tuition and living expenses with this amount. He said if his friends had not helped him, he would have had to leave the university with an incomplete education.

One of Amin’s friends collected money through contacts living abroad, while friends at the university also contributed in arranging the remainder.

Amin said he even tried to meet the vice chancellor through a senior university official in a bid to secure financial aid. However, when he turned up at the vice chancellor’s office on the designated date, the official retracted from his promise of arranging a meeting. He added the same thing happened with politicians who promised to help.

Amin’s father is an elderly man who is unemployed and lacks substantial sources of income. He also has three step-brothers, but neither of them extended any help.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 1^st, 2013.