More than 40 injured as students go on rampage

More than 40 people have been injured after baton-wielding paramilitary troops broke up a campus demonstration at the offices of Karachi University.

The protest was over the expulsion of a university professor and a proposed increase in tuition fees.

University officials said 36 students and eight teachers were injured.

The Pakistani Rangers intervened when the protest by several hundred people turned into a rampage.

Demonstrators smashed windows and furniture and broke down doors. They also damaged the vice chancellor's car, said Syed Khalid, the university's deputy registrar.

"I never witnessed such treatment meted out to teachers and professors at the campus like this," said Sarwar Naseem, an assistant professor whose left hand was fractured in two places in the melee.

It was the third day classes were disrupted over a plan by a national task force to restructure Pakistan's higher education system, including a hike in fees.

The protesters also were demanding the reinstatement of a zoology professor, Pervez Siddiqui, who the University Teachers Association said had been summarily dismissed without cause.