MULTAN: A 20-year-old law student was shot dead and two of his classmates were wounded outside a private university in Multan on Friday, hours after a quarrel in the campus cafeteria that staff believed they had settled.
The dead student was identified as Anas. The injured, Sameer, 20, and Ali Akbar, 21, were also enrolled in the law department of Multan University of Science and Technology. The shooting took place at Nag Shah Chowk on Muzaffargarh Road.
University sources told Dawn that Anas and a student from the computer science department exchanged harsh words in the cafeteria that morning. Security guards and teachers stepped in, spoke to both and sent them on their way. The two, with their supporters, then gathered again outside the campus gate.
What followed did not look like a scuffle between students. An eyewitness said a car pulled up, a young man with his face covered got out and opened fire on the group. All three victims were hit. Anas died in hospital. Rescue 1122 moved the body and the injured to Nishtar Hospital for medico-legal formalities.
Police describe the incident as the result of a dispute between two groups of students. The station house officer concerned, Sajad Hussain, said investigation and legal proceedings were under way. No arrest has been announced.
The university’s registrar, Ghulam Hussain Jafir, said the clash occurred outside the campus and that outsiders were involved in creating the disturbance. The administration regretted the death, he said, but it was for law enforcement to prevent such incidents.
That answer points to the gap in the middle of this case. The argument began inside the university, where staff intervened. The killing happened a few steps beyond the gate, where they had no authority. Between the two, nobody was responsible for the students who had just been told to disperse.
Students and residents blocked Muzaffargarh Road for several hours afterwards, demanding the gunman’s arrest and action against those behind the violence.
Three questions will decide whether the case is solved or merely filed. Who was the masked man, and was he a student at all? How did a firearm come to be brought to a campus quarrel within hours? And did the university alert police after the first confrontation? The province has been trying to tighten control of firearms, most recently by moving arms trade records online. A gun that can be summoned to a cafeteria dispute before lunchtime suggests how far that effort has to go.
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