Demonstration held against renaming physics department

Islamabad : Students, teachers and human right activists staged a demonstration against a resolution in the National Assembly changing the name of Department of Physics, Quaid-i-Azam University (QAU), as Abu Fateh Abdul Rehman Mansoor al-Khazini Department of Physics.

The resolution was also supported by liberal political parties like PPP, PTI and PML-N etc. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had issued the order to rename National Centre for Physics (NCP) in December 2016. The SDP never implemented the Prime Minister’s order.

The NCP set up by Dr Riaz-ud-Din in the building of Biology Department was later handed over to the Strategic Planning Division (SPD). The university had its own Institute of Physics with Dr Riaz as its founder director. It was later changed as Department of Physics.

Speaking on the occasion, Dr Pervaiz Amirali Hoodbhoy, former head of Physics Department, QAU, condemning the effort to change the name, said that Dr Salam is the only physicist of Pakistan known worldwide along with his contribution to academia and science. Many world scholarships are named after him. He also founded International Centre for Theoretical Physics, Trieste, Italy, He said that even the idea of the NCP was a brainchild of Dr Salam. Changing the name of the centre is travesty of established norms, he said.

Dr AH Nayyar, formerly a QAU and LUMS professor said that there is confusion as the resolution talks about naming of Physics Department of QAU and not the NCP.