By Staff Reporter
ISLAMABAD: An officer has been taken into custody and is facing disciplinary proceedings after a video showing him firing a pistol into the air during a confrontation with student protesters at a university in Islamabad circulated widely on social media, according to people familiar with the matter.
The footage, which began spreading on Monday, captures a chaotic scene at the Chattha Bakhtawar campus of Sarhad University of Science and Information Technology, where students had gathered to protest. What exactly sparked the demonstration remains unclear, with competing accounts circulating even as the video of its violent conclusion has drawn widespread attention.
In the video, a uniformed man is seen approaching a group of young men identified as SUSIT students, accompanied by a woman believed to be affiliated with the university. The footage shows the man striking one protester with a stick before a heated exchange erupts. The confrontation quickly turns physical, with members of the crowd surrounding the officer and appearing to strike him. He then draws a pistol and points it at the group. The woman beside him appears to try to intervene. Moments later, he raises the weapon and fires into the air. Police officers arrive shortly after, encircling the man and escorting him from campus.
A separate video, recorded afterward, shows a senior Islamabad police official addressing students on the scene. The officer tells the crowd the man has been removed from university grounds and will face consequences through military disciplinary channels.
What happened?
Local media reported that the officer was taken into custody and is facing proceedings under military law. They characterized the Pakistan Army’s response as consistent with its institutional emphasis on discipline and accountability, saying further action will hinge on the outcome of an internal inquiry. Officials did not provide additional detail on what led to the confrontation, and none spoke on the record.
Beyond that account, versions of what precipitated the clash diverge. Some reporting on the incident has tied the protest to the dismissal of a senior university official and unspecified grievances with the administration. Students, however, offered a different explanation on social media, saying they had gathered in support of a teacher they said had been mistreated by university administrators.
A third account, offered separately by a journalist Hamid Mir in a post on the social platform X, described a different chain of events entirely. Mir wrote that the confrontation followed the alleged mistreatment of a military officer’s female relative at the university, and that the woman had called the officer to campus, precipitating the clash. Mir said the officer was subsequently detained by his own institution and that an inquiry had been opened, adding that he expected strict disciplinary action for what he characterized as a violation of military conduct standards. Mir’s account has not been independently corroborated, and it was not immediately clear whether the woman he referenced was the same woman seen in the video accompanying the officer.
None of the competing explanations has been confirmed by an on-the-record source, and the university has not issued a public account of what prompted the demonstration.
Unanswered questions
The viral video itself does not show what happened before the officer’s arrival or establish what set off the altercation — a gap that has fueled much of the online speculation and disagreement over the episode. Some accounts of the incident have placed it as occurring as much as two days before the footage began circulating widely on Monday, though that timeline, like much else surrounding the case, has not been officially verified.
As of Monday night, neither Islamabad police, military authorities nor SUSIT had issued a formal statement addressing the confrontation, the identity or rank of the officer involved, or the specific circumstances that led to the protest. Police did not respond to questions about the status of the inquiry or when further information might be released.
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