Deadly clashes erupt at anti-quota student protest in Bangladesh

At least five people were killed and dozens injured in two separate incidents in Bangladesh as violence continued on university campuses in the nation's capital and elsewhere over a government jobs quota system, local media reports have said.

The deaths were reported on Tuesday after an overnight violence at a public university near Bangladesh’s capital, Dhaka.

The overnight violence involved members of a pro-government student body and other students, when police fired tear gas and charged the protesters with batons during the clashes which spread at Jahangir Nagar University in Savar, outside Dhaka, according to students and authorities.

Protesters have been demanding an end to a quota reserved for family members of veterans who fought in Bangladesh’s war of independence in 1971, which allows them to take up 30 percent of governmental jobs.

They argue that quota appointments are discriminatory and should be merit-based. Some even said the current system benefits groups supporting Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.

Some Cabinet ministers criticised the protesters, saying they played on students’ emotions.

Dhaka-based Daily Star newspaper reported that two persons including a pedestrian were killed as they suffered injuries during violence in Chattogram, a southeastern district, on Tuesday.

Bengali-language Prothom Alo daily reported that a 22-year-old protester died in the northern district of Rangpur. Details of the casualties could not be confirmed immediately.

While job opportunities have expanded in Bangladesh’s private sector, many find government jobs stable and lucrative. Each year, some 3,000 such jobs open up to nearly 400,000 graduates.

Protesters gathered in front of the university’s official residence of the vice-chancellor early Tuesday when violence broke out.

'Peaceful protests'

Demonstrators accused the Bangladesh Chhatra League, a student wing of Hasina’s ruling Awami League party, of attacking their "peaceful protests."

According to local media reports, police and the ruling party-backed student wing attacked the protesters.

More than 50 people were treated at Enam Medical College Hospital near Jahangir Nagar University as the violence continued for hours, said Ali Bin Solaiman, a medical officer of the hospital. He said at least 30 of them suffered pellet wounds.

On Monday, violence also spread at Dhaka University, the country’s leading public university, as clashes gripped the campus in the capital. More than 100 students were injured in the clashes, police said.

On Tuesday, protesters blocked railways and some highways across the country, and in Dhaka, they halted traffic in many areas as they vowed to continue demonstrating until the demands were met.

Local media said police forces were spread across the capital to safeguard the peace.

Protesters say they are apolitical, but leaders of the ruling parties accused the opposition of using the demonstrations for political gains.

The family of the veterans' quota system was halted following a court order after mass student protests in 2018. But last month, Bangladesh’s High Court nulled the decision to reinstate the system once more, angering scores of students and triggering protests.

The quota system also reserves government jobs for women, disabled people and ethnic minority groups, but students have only protested against jobs reserved for veterans' families.

Prime Minister Hasina maintained power in an election in January that was again boycotted by the country’s main opposition party and its allies due to Hasina’s refusal to step down and hand over power to a caretaker government to oversee the election.

Her party favours keeping the quota for the families of the 1971 war heroes after her Awami League party, under the leadership of her father Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, led the independence war with the help of India.