Over 600 students of Fatima Jinnah Medical College, Lahore, held a protest demonstration and blocked The Mall against the college's affiliation with the University of Health Sciences.

Students protest against college affiliation with UHS
Lahore: Over 600 students of Fatima Jinnah Medical College, Lahore, held a protest demonstration and blocked The Mall against the college's affiliation with the University of Health Sciences.

Students came out of the college in the morning and blocked the Queens Road and The Mall for more than three hours from 10 am onwards, which caused massive traffic jam on two roads and diversion of traffic to linking roads. The traffic jam inconvenienced motorists. Students organised a sit-in on The Mall for more than two hours to press the government for accepting their demands. Citizens and policemen argued with students but they refused to disperse. Ambulances also found it difficult to make their way for timely transportation of patients to hospitals.

Meanwhile, the Young Doctors' Association (YDA) has announced that it would support students of the FJMC. "The decision to affiliate the FJMC with the UHS should be reverted," said Dr Salman Kazmi, the general secretary of the YDA in a statement issued on Monday.

Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Central Information Secretary Omar Sarfaraz Cheema has condemned the government for its actions against Fatima Jinnah Medical College.

He said the students had been lodging protests quietly within the college premises for the past six days but the government had not paid any heed to their valid demands.