HEJ developed treatment of a disease.

By Zoobia Noor.

Researchers belonging to the University of Karachi (KU) Hussein Ebrahim Jamal (HEJ) Research Institute of Chemistry have developed a herbal ointment for the treatment of a common skin disease, leishmaniasis.

HEJ Research Institute of Chemistry Director Prof Dr M Iqbal Choudhary described the study on leishmaniasis as the first of its kind in the region. This research was conducted in collaboration with Jinnah Post Graduate Medical College Dermatology Department Head Dr Azam Samdani and Dermatologist and Larkana Leprosy Unit In-charge Dr Farooq Soomro.


Leishmaniasis is an infectious skin disease that looks like a wound and is caused by the parasite, leishmania. The disease is transmitted through the bite of sand files usually active in the evening and night. These flies breed in dense vegetation and caves or burrows of small rodents. The infection due to the parasite shows on the skin and the disease usually shows on the hands, feet and face, said Research Officer .

Cutaneous (skin) leishmaniasis is most common in Pakistan and is seen in the people of Balochistan, upper Sindh and northern mountainous areas, mostly in the winter. This disease is caused by a different species of leishmania, including leishmania major and leishmania tropica. In 2001, the biggest outbreak of this disease was seen in districts of Larkana, Sukkur and Dadu.


The treatment of the disease involves the drug pentavelant antimonials but as it has severe side effects as well as the fact that the parasite is becoming resistant to the drug is limiting its usefulness.
Administering the medicine via an injection is painful and the drug is expensive too besides it has side effects, whereas a herbal ointment extracted from garlic bulbs and different plant species has little to no side effects and can be easily applied to the patient's skin.


Sameen , a researcher maintained that five years of research have shown that this is the cheapest treatment, which all patients can afford.

During the primary study, when the herbal ointment was applied to 200 patients suffering from skin leishmaniasis, 150 patients responded positively. This disease can happen to people of all ages but it is usually common in the elderly.

Leishmaniasis affects the internal organs of the body including the spleen, liver and bone marrow. Visceral leishmaniasis is the second most prevalent type of leishmaniasis in Pakistan after cutaneous leishmaniasis," she further said. This disease is more common in rural areas while the parasites may also be spread through blood transfusions and sharing contaminated needles.

People who have cutaneous leishmaniasis have one or more sores on their skin. These sores can change their size and can become larger over time, while some of the sores are covered by a scab. These sores may be painful or painless. In some cases glands also form near the sores.
This herbal oinment do not have any side effects..

Walls that wail…

By Summya Khan.

One of my fellow bloggers wrote a post on how some students from the English department painted their walls and decorated their long-time ugly walls. It was good to know that at least some of the students are concerned about their atmosphere. But there is one department, where the students are, well, “over” concerned about the environment of their department. They are none other than our own, mass communication students a.k.a. MCDians.

I am certainly not going to criticize my fellows here. It’s just that, their intentions are pure, but they fail to realize that their efforts are damaging the look of the department. For instance, while celebrating “Earth Day”, several pictures of trees and plants were made with the help of newspapers and were pasted onto the walls of the department. The message was clear: keep your environment healthy. Everybody at the department praised the efforts of the students. I, myself, watered plants that day. And after doing that I took pictures of the walls and showed it to my friends from the other departments, proudly, telling them how much we cared.

Few days back, a friend from General History came to visit my department’s building. She instantly spotted the walls and cried out, “what have you done to the walls?” I was startled. When she left, I took a closer look at the walls and noticed that she certainly was right.

All those posters, pictures, pamphlets etc. that were once put on for a purpose (which looked attractive then) were tearing down. All those posters pasted directly onto the walls, carelessly with countless scotch tapes, were now looking old and untidy. As a result, the walls of my department are giving an ugly and messy impression to the eyes.

Since, mass communication is my department; it is my solemn duty to make it look better. But this also goes out to all those students, who like painting walls and putting on posters, that not to paste any pamphlet or poster ‘directly’ onto the walls for it will damage the paint. It’s better to put this stuff on the soft boards provided by the administration.

In the end, I would like to mention that there are some other students, whom I like to call, ‘the troublemakers’. They are the ones who spoil the walls on purpose: mostly by scribbling and by spitting betel nut. My request to these troublemakers is that please do not harm the department’s look by your shameful acts. It not only creates an untidy look but also shows what kind of students resides at this department.

Love street or Food Street???

By Kanwal Naz

My fellow bloggers mentioned a lot of negative points regarding my alma mater. But I would like to mention that Karachi University is one place that has so much to offer other than problems and studies. We have sports, festivals, picnics, clashes (yes we do offer those as well) and last but certainly not the least K.U. has P.G. It is indeed the most exciting place at K.U.

“Prem Galii” means the “love street”. But I guess it is a pseudonym. “Prem Galii” has everything except for “prem” (love). Why? Well it is because of the overwhelming presence of students from each and every department. According to physics, matter always has a center of gravity, and P.G. is the center of gravity of our university. It’s the closest canteen to each faculty. All the students rush towards P.G. to enjoy their time off. Therefore, lots and lots of students can be found at this place throughout the morning shift. And as we all know that “prem” that is “love”, unlike misery, doesn’t like company. As a result, all the “love birds” prefer to fly north of P.G. i.e. the sociology department or east i.e. the Vallika Ground.

To tell the truth, it is simply a canteen where students come to enjoy or have lunch. But the place is really a blessing because it has all the junk food there is in this world. From oily ‘parathas’
to ‘bun kebabs’ to greasy spring rolls to mouth-watering “gol gappas”. You name it, you got it. They even have “biryani” there which is not commonly found at other universities. To be short and precise, if you ever get bored of your canteen’s club sandwiches, just come and visit P.G. and you will get all what you want.

Whenever there is a function at K.U. for example the Independence Day, P.G. is a must to be visited. You will find all the students together having the time of their lives. Even the outsiders love to come and visit P.G. whenever there is a special occasion. This place is a trademark of our university and we are actually very proud of it.

To all those people who haven’t visited P.G.: visit “prem galii” if you have “prem” for food and do not miss out on “sagar bhai’s” chicken chapati rolls. You will certainly not be disappointed.

We need Security…

By Syeda Nadia Zarif

Security is a big issue these days as the present situation of Pakistan is not at all satisfactory. Terrorists are targeting almost everyone and everywhere even the educational institutions and religious places are not safe from them and our Government has totally failed to control this situation.

In the light of the recent terrorist attempts, almost all of the public and private sectors, on their own, have taken strong measures to safeguard people from any kind of mishap.


But at the same time, our very own Karachi University, once again seems to be really cool about the whole situation. We all know that many educational institutions have been targeted by terrorists in the recent past but still our management is not doing anything appreciable in this regard.

First of all, the undersized boundary walls are welcoming anyone and everyone at all times, with open hands, facilitating terrorists to enter the premises of the varsity at any hour. Secondly, in the name of security we have a small number of security guards, on the four entry gates; they are mostly found having a chit chat or in a deep slumber even during these days when the security ought to be strict.

Also, there is a formality at K.U. that all the students have to show their student I.D. cards to a screaming lady who yells at us with all her might but never checks anyone.

In the end, I would like to mention that we need some reliable security arrangements to make our university a secure place. Firstly, a security staff of educated, sincere, dedicated (not to mention polite) members is needed and they should be provided with Metal Detectors for the proper checking of each and every person entering the varsity gates. There should be a certain building which could serve as the Centralized Security Control Room with necessary equipments and more security guards so that they constantly keep an eye out. CCTV Cameras should be installed at the exit and entry gates of the university. All these measures must be put into action as soon as possible.

One word of advice to our authorities: Let’s not wait for an accident to happen and then regret in front of the media using the words “if only we had enough security”.

Help yourself!!

By Sameen Meher

The University of Karachi is full of energetic students who are hard working and dedicated. (Please don’t laugh) We are indeed. When our esteemed administration fails to provide us anything, we adopt the “God helps those who help themselves” policy. For instance, the pitiable condition of the walls of our faculty is as old as the hills. And no one, I repeat, no one in the administration or in the management pays heed to the innumerable pleas coming out from the concerned students. As a result, it is “us”, the students who do the job ourselves.

It is noticeable that some departments of the arts faculty have become too old and their walls like those of Mohenjo daro. But the authorities still pretend to remain oblivious of the situation. It so happens, that when all attempts to get their attention, fail, students from their respective departments rise to the occasion and take the job into their own hands, using their time and cash to decorate their departments and classes all by themselves.

Last year, during the students’ week the students of Psychology, Education and English literature contributed their efforts to embellish their classrooms and walls. They paid for the oil paints and made colorful charts for the walls.

Students of the English literature department did not only paint the walls of their classes but also renovated their seminar library. Also, the students of Education and Psychology made beautiful charts related to their subjects that made the walls look attractive like never before.

Now the outsiders, get a good impression of the university (and mistakenly of the management) when they see all that decoration.

Therefore, I think the management of KU is totally useless and the students ought to make a committee to collect funds from chancellor and take care of their departments themselves.  

Praising my Education system..!

By Suleman Saadat Khan.

"Jo chala gaya usay bhool ja, yeh tere naseeb ki baat hai"

When my fate modulated that I have to be a journalist then the journey of this delectable voyage started like this..

After getting 51% in the intermediate, getting admission in any department of Karachi University was impossible except the Bengali where just teachers and the officials are seen with the empty classrooms. The only department I wanted to get in was Mass Communication, which was a wishful dream to me at first due to the lousy merit criteria. But the only good thing that is ever done by the government for the sportsmen like me is that we can easily get admission in universities on the sports quota in any field of our choice.

Eventually I got the admission, and I was happy and was flying high .Beginning was good due to the beautiful chicks and the idea of buying new shoes and clothes every month. But as the time passed, the idea of becoming journalist fainted and new clothes and shoes looked like a hearsay story: "once upon a time a boy got admission and he used to think like this but ….. Ab toh Sirf Ma’am Sadia Mehmood kay blog aur Sana Batool kay messages kay khayalaat hi atay hein".


Even after the delightful journey of 21 months I was unable to see the "D" of the delight. I came to know something extremely interesting and sizzling and I can’t resist sharing it with you. I will start from the gender ratio in the department that is 20/80, 20% percent boys and 80% girls ( Kaa yeh khula tazzaaad nai ) and majority of them are from sciences. Most of them those who failed to get the admission in some good medical college. So, what’s the point of raising this issue? Normal low-profile students in their (medical students who couldn’t make to the medical college) like me get low marks because we are studying Arts since we got our first official recognition as students from the government. But our "genius scientists" of pre-engineering and pre-medical are used to reading and mugging up heavy heavy, thick thick and non-understandable books, so ultimately they’re highest scorers due to this remarkable ability.

Now let’s praise some of our courses like Mathematics and the sciences which we’ve learned and will be learning in future because (insaan martay dam tak sikhta hai, zindagee ustaad aur hum shagird hotay hein) after all we are going to be journalists. Wow! I know our department looks like a chemistry or physics lab but it doesn’t mean that the authorities have rights to forcibly teach us the subjects which have no connection with the journalism at all.

These were the two lamentations that I think every second student from the department of mass communication; Karachi University has. People might call it frustration but not seeing a camera being a student of journalism & having done no practical work except writing blogs and searching Google for the assignment is enough to make any normal person frustrated. If you call it call frustration, then yes I am frustrated. But what about the teachers who have nothing for us except telling their personal experiences and doing criticism on the organizations they are working for, are they doing justice to their jobs? I hope fellow mates will catch my points rightly.

Well there is so much to write and criticize. From internal corruption and teachers’ lobbies to the mismanagement and pilfering of urinary duct, but I have to submit a new story every week in order to get good marks, so ill stop here.

QUIT please!!!

By Fatimah Mazhar


Once my major teacher declared ‘teamwork is good, all of you who think that doing an assignment individually is better, can quit the group you are in’. Well, I was the one who went for the ‘one man show’ policy and this sentence was targeted at me.

All this happened when our teacher was assigning us a blog…this blog actually.Sahafionline. A name that is, to some, childish and a not-up to-the-standard assignment for students in their second year mass communication degree.

I am writing this article because I am facing issues with such people who think that this assignment is too impractical. They are the ones who are ‘career-oriented’, ‘creative minded’, ‘aspiring’, ‘adventurous’ etc. but I wonder why do these ‘professionals’ skip assignments and classes, and in doing so, cause problems for the people who are here (at the university) to learn. They are the ones who want a rather ‘practical’ approach towards our assignments and curriculum. Well, if you want this, why don’t you use your ‘EXPERTISE’ and start a campaign against this program of study which you loathe so much???

                                                                          

This is one problem that is always confronted while working in a group: some people never take it seriously. They are too clumsy to do their assignments and give innumerable excuses to hide their failures. Actually they are the ones who are the aspiring “media people” of our country .Honestly, I will doubt the caliber of my country’s media if it will accept people who were not even sincere with minor assignments at their university.

My plea to students like these: “if you are ‘that’ career oriented, I guess these insignificant assignments should not be much of an issue to you. After all, if you have the moral fiber to report the Afghan War as a correspondent then definitely you can take out some time for this blog and stop creating problems for the group members (who were reluctant to have you in their group).

You are the would-be journalists; reporters etc. shouldn’t teamwork be one of your principles? And if you really think that you want to make a team with your kind, it’s my humble request to you: quit please!”

Working in a group for assignments is always a challenge if you end up with people who are not cooperative. In my opinion, such people ought to leave and form a group of their own. May be, they could create something big with their brilliant brains working together.

Constant Vigilance!!!

Time & Trouble..!..

By Zoobia Noor..

As the Holy month of Ramadan has now ended so.we would definitely observe a change in our University schedule..

The University timings always changes in the month of Ramadan..The timings for the first class changes from 8:30 to 8 o'clock despite of the fact that official timings for points is 8:30..

. .As most of the students in the campus use points as their mode of transport,so it becomes difficult for them to reach at 8 to attend the first class...every year,the changes in timings for the month of Ramadan becomes a reason for debate between students and the administration..
Students have to rush for their classes as mostly miss half of the lectures of the first class throughout the month..

In some departments teachers starts the class sharp at 8,without considering the issue of point timings..

Beside this, the students who come by public buses or by private transport wait for shuttles and lifts at the muskan gate as its a tough job to walk all the way long to the departments from muskan especially when one is fasting..

During Ramadan,point timings should also be chaged alongwith the timings and schedule of classes..
 This is an important issue for not only people who use points,but also for the rest as 8 o'clock seems very early for everyone and so we have 0% attendance in the morning classes in month of Ramadan...

At the end of this Holy month ,we again have a good hope for the next year and next Ramadan..

We hope that we will have no timing issues next year and will be able to attend our classes in the morning time..and will no more be irritated by the schedule.. ..

We have big hopes but their decisions seems bigger than anything else ..!