Pakistan province shuts schools, universities amid student protests

Punjab authorities besides prohibition gatherings arsenic hundreds are arrested portion protesting reports of a rape connected a assemblage campus.

Authorities successful Pakistan’s astir populous state person ordered each acquisition institutes unopen arsenic student-led protests turn aft allegations of rape connected a assemblage campus.

The interior section successful Punjab state besides banned gatherings connected Friday and Saturday.

The closure is expected to impact astir 26 cardinal children successful summation to big learners successful the eastbound province.

Rawalpindi constabulary serviceman Syed Khalid Mehmood Hamdani told the AFP quality bureau connected Friday that 380 radical had been arrested implicit vandalism and arson during protests successful the metropolis the erstwhile time and investigations were ongoing.

“We volition way down radical from societal media,” helium said.

Protests broke retired successful the provincial superior Lahore past week aft societal media reports dispersed that a pistillate pupil was raped successful the basement of the Punjab College for Women campus.

Police arrested a information defender who was identified successful online posts but said nary unfortunate had travel guardant and that they had not been capable to verify the rape allegation.

The protests person since dispersed to campuses crossed Lahore arsenic good arsenic the metropolis of Rawalpindi, which neighbours the nationalist superior Islamabad, with students accusing authorities of a cover-up.

Students hurl stones astatine information unit during a objection to condemn the alleged rape of a pistillate student, successful Rawalpindi, Pakistan, connected October 17, 2024 [Ghulam Rasool/AFP]

Hundreds of students were arrested successful assorted cities for blocking roads, injuring information personnel, and vandalism.

The protests bespeak a heavy interest among Pakistani students implicit safety, harassment, and intersexual battle against women astatine colleges, arsenic good arsenic mistrust successful authorities.

Authorities said an probe squad formed to probe the allegations recovered nary grounds of rape and formed uncertainty implicit the motives down the protests.

“The incidental does not exist,” Arif Chaudry, the Lahore manager of the backstage Punjab Group of Colleges that runs the women’s college, said astatine a quality league connected Wednesday.

“I volition resign and I volition permission this assemblage and basal with the students if the incidental took place.”

The main curate of the province, Maryam Nawaz Sharif, said those who dispersed the mendacious posts would beryllium punished.

The Progressive Students Collective, 1 of the groups calling for protests, demanded the enactment of a committee that includes autarkic quality rights organisations, pupil representatives and judges.

Source

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Al Jazeera and quality agencies