Bolan University of Health and Medical Sciences (BUHMS) was established in the December of 2017 and later granted the responsibility for admitting students in all public sector medical colleges of Balochistan which include Makran Medical College, Jhalawan Medical College, Loralai Medical College and Bolan Medical College as its constituent, while BUHMS acting as the sole Medical university in Balochistan.
But, all is not well. Medical students, especially of Bolan Medical College, are under protest for two months now. According to a statement by Baloch Students Action Committee(BSAC)—the student body behind BMC protests—after the establishment of BUHMS, tuition fees have been increased from 10 thousand to 88 thousand and hostel fee from 5 thousand to 26 thousand, while their scholarships have not been released for a year now.
Baloch Students Organization—a nationalist and leftist student body—has accused that the University is slowly being privatized.
On the 12th of February, with all these demands, students from different bodies along with employees of the college sat in protest in front of Balochistan assembly. Later, it was seen that instead of paying heed to their demands, students were removed from the area by brutal force, many of the male students were arrested and female students were manhandled.
Mahrang Baloch, a female student of the college, who had met education minister of Balochistan later that night, accused that the minister had forcibly removed her from the office and asked her to sit at her home as she is a woman and women in Balochistan should not come out on roads.
It is a matter of serious concern that sitting education minister whose only job is to facilitate the students but he allegedly humiliates a female student and the government whose job only is to make lives easy for the citizens, uses force against them.
Concerned authorities should pay serious heed to the woes of students, in general, and medical students, in particular in Balochistan.