Four foreign professors have refused to attend an international conference at the University of Sialkot over the ‘poor treatment’ meted out to former Punjab University Vice Chancellor Prof Dr Mujahid Kamran. University of Sialkot Vice Chancellor Dr Ijaz Qureshi said Monday in a statement that Prof Mike Whitty of University of Detroit in Michigan, USA, Prof Donna Schaeffer of Marymount University in Virginia, USA, Prof Asayen Desta of Dominican University California in USA and Prof Dhruba Sen of Richmond College in London had refused to attend the conference, scheduled for February 2019, citing public humiliation of Pakistan’s known top scientist Dr Kamran when he was handcuffed by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) authorities during a case hearing in an accountability court last month.
Photos and video footages showing former Vice Chancellor Dr Kamran and other senior retired professors being presented before Lahore’s accountability court in handcuffs sparked a public outrage on social media, with calls for holding NAB officials accountable. Following the poor treatment meted out to the top academic, Chief Justice of Pakistan Mian Saqib Nisar took suo motu notice and rebuked the NAB officials. “It is like death for a professor if he is handcuffed as the impression cannot be undone for the rest of his life,” the top judge had said. Later, NAB DG Saleem Shehzad submitted a written apology before the court and said that he was ashamed for what had been done.
Published in Daily Times, November 6th 2018.
