Balochistan is confronting severe disturbances in everyday life since Jam Kamal has taken oath as the Chief Minister of the province. The government sounds hopeless to resolving issues of the inhabitants_ be it the issue of missing persons or collation of the varily parties in the Provincial Assembly.
However, the recent educational woes have weakened the backbone of the government-in-rule. The first challenge is, Bahauddin Zakariya University Multan and Islamia University Bhawalpur have cancelled the scholarships for the students of Balochistan. A number of students, seeking admissions in various disciplines of the varsities, have returned back home helplessly after they were asked to pay the dues.
Secondly, the Balochistan Medical College Act 2017 has turned out to come in a very crucial phase when the students and employees have sit-in hunger strike camp till death.
Since the BMC act in 2017, Balochistan University of Medical and Health Sciences has washed away the hopes of many a poor background student by increasing the fees structure. Since BMC was the only ray of hope for the people of Balochistan_ from poor to rich_ the recent dynamics in the set up have entirely reshaped the scenerio from perspective to perspective; ultimately, asking the students with middle class backgrounds to quit the race of the medical field.
To amend the BMC Act 2017, the future doctors are sitting on roads in hunger strike till death. They have finalized their decisions calling it either a death for them or the amendment of the Act.
Sadly, the government in such an alarming situation amid the Covid-19 is seen nowhere around to resolving the issues of the doctors. Is it that the government has left the protestors [students] to die of hunger strike but would not have a look back to the act?
Reports coming from the protest camp that a number of BMC students are getting unconscious due to consecutive days of hunger strike and are one by one being shifted to hospital for treatment. But, they have continously been refusing to break their hunger strike until the amendment is guaranteed. Is it what the Baloch students are meant to face all their life?
Coming across a post in social media, it states “My student card is helpless to save my life”, narrating how the students in Balochistan are in danger_ not from outsiders but the government and Law Enforcement Agencies.
The very recent example is of Hayat Baloch who was brutally killed by a soldier of Frontier Corps in Turbat a couple of days earlier.
One wonders, where is Mr. Jam Kamal when the situations in Balochistan are out of control? He has not shown serious concerns to the murder of Hayat Baloch to the cancellation of scholarships of Baloch students in Punjab’s varsities; and then it comes to the hunger-till-death strike of BMC students where he [the Chief Minister] is out of the picture.
All in all, Mr. Jam Kamal has to stand by the students_ that too of medical_ who have played precious roles under the worst and dangerous situations of Coronavirus. It was the doctors who took all the risk and helped the patients of Corona getting well the soonest. In fact, a number of doctors lost their lives in this duration.
The doctors, sacrificing their lives for the nation, are today left to sleep in hunger strike just for a pretty amendment in an act of the well-interest of the province. Mr. Kamal is a public representative. Sadly, he is lost to represent the province in times of need.
He has to arrange a team to review the act and bring about the amendment the soonest. Secondly, he has to send an official team to the protest camp of BMC students to convince them to break their hunger strike by ensuring them the amendment would be made after a review of the act.
If Mr. Jam fails to do so, it would definitely mark his government a nightmare in the history of Balochistan. All we have to watch is how Mr. Kamal is going to respond to their demands and deal with the ongoing circumstances in a time when the reported cases of coronavirus are increasing.
