Once there stood a campus by the Arabian Sea,
Where dreams were louder than the winds of Karachi.
Where footsteps of youth echoed in corridors wide,
And courage walked proudly with knowledge as its guide.
But today the gates whisper a sorrowful decree:
“Petrol is costly… Gas is scarce…
So let the university live online and be.”
O Alma Mater!
Is this how the torch of learning must fade?
Not by invasion of ignorance—
But by the arithmetic of fuel prices paid?
In the late seventies the story was different.
The university trembled, yes—but not from silence.
The treasury was empty, the salaries unpaid,
Professors waited… clerks prayed.
The institution that shaped generations
Was standing on the edge of humiliation.
And in those restless days of 1977,
Twenty thousand students placed their faith in one voice—
Not for privilege, not for power,
But for the survival of the university itself.
I still remember those anxious nights,
When hope was thinner than the ink on our petitions.
As Secretary General of the student body,
I walked not toward despair, but toward the corridors of power.
To the Chief Martial Law Administrator I went,
Carrying not a request—but a responsibility.
And by the grace of determination and dialogue,
An emergency presidential grant was secured—
Eight hundred thousand dollars
To rescue a dying university.
Eight hundred thousand dollars—
Not for buildings of vanity,
But to pay the teachers who shaped our minds,
And the workers who kept the gates of knowledge open.
Today, the Silver Jubilee Monument of Karachi University
Still stands quietly on that soil,
A silent witness to those moments
When youth refused to let an institution collapse.
History carved those memories in stone—
But time has covered them with dust.
And now, decades later,
The proud university that once resisted bankruptcy
Bows before petrol prices.
Classes that once filled lecture halls with debate
Now dissolve into fragile internet signals.
The campus that once roared with intellectual rebellion
Now sleeps behind closed gates.
How strange is the age we live in.
In those days, students fought to keep universities alive.
Today, universities surrender to convenience.
In those days, honor belonged to sacrifice.
Today, medals of “performance” decorate
Those who plunder the state’s treasury.
In those days, history was written with courage.
Today, history is forgotten with comfort.
O Karachi University,
My Alma Mater…
The banyan trees still remember us.
The libraries remember our sleepless nights.
The dusty pathways remember our marches,
Our slogans, our dreams.
They remember a generation
That believed knowledge was worth defending.
But today the classrooms sit empty,
And the campus listens to a different silence.
Perhaps the monuments still whisper:
“Where are the students who once refused to surrender?”
Perhaps the wind passing through the gates asks softly:
“Where are the guardians of this institution now?”
And somewhere in the distance,
History wipes a tear from its eye—
For an Alma Mater
That once survived bankruptcy through courage…
Yet today retreats
Before the price of petrol.
Author:
Dr. Gholam Mujtaba, MS, MD, Ed.D.
Chairman, Pakistan Policy Institute USA.
A former elected student leader of Karachi University in the late 1970s, he has long been engaged in academic leadership, public policy, and international dialogue on education, governance, and diplomacy.
