On November 2 and 3, 2019, in a meeting hosted by the Progressive Students’ Collective, more than twenty students’ organisations from all across the country, including Gilgit-Baltistan (GB) and Azad Jammu & Kashmir (AJK) formed the Students’ Action Committee to demand revival of student unions and other issues in higher education.

The committee vowed to
launch a nationwide struggle for revival of student unions, against the cut in
educational budget, increasing harassment cases in universities, security
forces interferences in educational institutions, student torture cases, lack
of educational infrastructure and ban on freedom of expression. It also decided
that the first public activity under the banner of Students’ Action Committee
would be the Students’ Solidarity March on November 29, 2019.

The current crisis of
higher education in Pakistan confronts students in the form of rising cost of
education and a drastic decrease in immediate returns from a college degree.
Not only is it harder to afford college education, but education expenses also
leave students and their families in more debt and with limited job
opportunities. A shrinking job market with employment opportunities swayed
through social capital in the form of “contacts” has no space for a majority of
graduates.

We are marching on November 29 to organise and to seek institutional power in universities and create a way of holding onto that power. It’s our education — we should control it.

It seems like a
four-year degree only qualifies one to become a daily-wage labourer. Given this
continual crisis, students are organising on campuses across the country for
the forthcoming Students’ Solidarity March, after so many decades their
struggles for the restoration of students’ unions are not fragmented but
coordinated.

Since the collapse of
the students’ movement of the 70s and the subsequent ban on student unions in
1984 under the dictatorship of General Ziaul Haq, most campus activism has
taken the form of single-issue groups. There is a ban on any kind of political
activity by students on campus and those who have tried to raise their voice
for rights, have been rusticated, abducted and sometimes killed by fascist
groups. By using anti-terror laws, their voices have been suppressed.

Due to different kinds of repression on campuses, students haven’t been able to form an alliance that can give voice to all those being robbed of their rights and facing severe repression.

From the past one year,
students are agitating in different campuses on different issues, which include
protests and sit-ins against fee hikes, sexual harassment, against the
abduction of a number of students and for better housing, internet and transport
facilities on campuses.

While the resistance
that popped up at Quaid-e-Azam University (QAU) against budget cuts and tuition
hikes remained partially successful in pressurising the administration to succumb
to some of their demands, the fiscal situation and budget cuts at QAU are not
unique.

We are marching because if we want to create radical change on our campuses — change that addresses economic and cultural aspects of our life — we need to move towards students’ unionism.

Provincial governments
across the country are cutting funding to schools and universities; the
university officials are using budget cuts to jack up tuition fees (hikes that
will continue for a long time) and to cut essential services and programmes.
While the students at QAU, Punjab University (PU), Sindh University (SU) and
the University of Balochistan (UoB) are putting up an amazing response to fee
hikes, sexual harassment and securitisation of campuses, a coordinated effort
under the banner of Students’ Action Committee to revive student unions would
be more beneficial for the student body to assert its power as a class that
represents the youth of this country.

Therefore, we are marching on November 29 to organise and to seek institutional power in universities and create a way of holding onto that power.

Progressive policy
changes are a great thing on our campuses and they should be fought for, but
they should be fought for in the context of building student power at campus
level as well as at national level. Building student power means gaining more
and more control over our campuses and the decisions that affect us as students.
In the end, student power means a student-run higher education system.

It’s our education — we should control it.

We are marching
together to ensure that local victories do not become isolated pockets of
progress and resistance. We are marching to ensure that this work spreads and
students find ways to coordinate efforts with those underway at other campuses
in their areas.

Movements grow not only by example, but when they actively engage people and share resources and hard-earned lessons. Because the federal government still makes most of the higher education policy decisions, students also need to coordinate on the national level in ways that foster cross-campus solidarity and encourage local initiatives.

We are also aware of
the fact that coordinating efforts should never mean that local campus organising
becomes merely an extension of some larger campaign because this sort of
strategy cannot support long haul organising. We need coordination that is
mutually beneficial to everyone involved.

We are marching on November 29 because if we want to create radical change on our campuses — change that addresses economic and cultural aspects of our life — we need to move towards students’ unionism. Unions that are run by the rank and file students; that fight alongside faculty and workers; that seek to empower the historically oppressed and revolutionise our educational system.