Students of Jahangirnagar University, Rajshahi University and Shahjalal University of Science and Technology (SUST) stage demonstrations on their respective campuses yesterday protesting attacks on students by police and alleged Chhatra League men at Jhigatola in Dhaka and also demanding safe roads.
Our Jahangirnagar University correspondent says: Students of Jahangirnagar University (JU) protested the attack on students who are demonstrating for safe roads across the country. About 11.30 am, thousands of students brought out a protest rally from the central Shahid Minar premises that paraded different street on the campus.
After the rally, the students denounced the attack on the students of school and college level by police and some miscreants at Zigatola in the afternoon. They also demanded the resignation of shipping minister Shajahan Khan at the rally.
Earlier, over 500 students of different departments and institutes brought out a protest possession from Central Shahid Minar premises for safe highway about at 12:00pm. The protest rally paraded different streets on the campus and blocked the Dhaka-Aricha highway for half an hour. The students from different schools and colleges joined the protest rally. The protesters took over traffic control and they left the highway about half an hour later.
Meanwhile, the final examinations of Economics, Fine Arts, Chemistry and Journalism and Media Studies department were postponed while classes of most of the departments remained suspended.
Our Rajshahi University correspondent reports: Students of Rajshahi University (RU) staged demonstration by forming a human chain on the university campus in the morning, while a section of RU teachers brought out a silent procession expressing solidarity with the ongoing nationwide student movement demanding safe roads.
The students also announced to boycott classes and examination for unidentified period.
Meanwhile, several hundred students of Rajshahi University of Engineering and Technology (RUET) have blocked the Dhaka-Rajshahi highway protesting the attacks.
In solidarity with the protesting students of schools and colleges, the students gathered in front of RUET main entrance around 11:30am and enforced the blockade, only allowing emergency service vehicles to pass through. Student of Varenda University demonstrated at Talaimari intersection on the highway around 11:00am by blocking the intersection. This is the third day, students are staging demonstration in Rajshahi after students of schools and colleges in Dhaka began their protest programmes on Sunday, July 29, and are continuing the demonstrations for the eighth day yesterday.
Meanwhile, the Association of Indigenous Students, of Shahjalal University of Science and Technology (SUST) unit yesterday formed a human chain and rally demanding safe roads and justice for rape victims of the Chittagong Hill Tracts, reports UNB.
They formed a human-chain around 1 pm and held a procession which marched around the campus. Later, the students held a rally at central library of the campus.
The speakers of the protest said the government should ensure social security and safe roads but the government seems indifferent to such demands. They said incidents of rape continue to persist in the Hill Tracts and around the country and condemned government for all such incidents.
They also urged the government to bring the culprits of accidents and rape under justice and ensure security for countrymen.
On July 29, Diya Khanam Mim and Abdul Karim Rajib, students of the college section of Shaheed Ramiz Uddin School and College, were killed as a 'Jabal-e-Noor Paribahan' bus ploughed through some students in front of Kurmitola General Hospital on Airport Road which sparked off protests among the students across the country.