A case for student unions
They have always been the agents of change. The engine pulling every revolution, the catalyst bringing socio-political change, the hope lighting in the darkness of disillusion and misery, their power has been the moving spirit behind every change that took place - the student power - the power that stems from the campus and institutionalized in the form of student unions. From the story of Mao Zedong to that of Gandhi, from that of Che Guevara to that of Martin Luther King, from Mandella’s triumph to Muhammad Ali Jinnah’s, it has been the wings and arms of every major revolution and peoples’ triumph.In Pakistan the debacle of the first czar, Ayub Khan, was caused by this power and probably it was then that the powers that be realized that if they want to build an unchallenged and secure hold on the society and polity of the land of pure, they will have to erode this powerhouse. And the plan began - a plan of demeaning the student power and student unions.For the first time in Pakistan,...