Bangladesh: Engineering students block traffic in Dhaka, raise demands

Dhaka, Aug 27 (IANS) Several students from engineering universities, including Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET), blocked Shahbagh intersection in Dhaka on Wednesday for the second consecutive day, pressing home their three-point demand, local media reported.

The police reportedly used tear gas, sound grenades, and water cannons to disperse the protesting students as they tried to march towards Jamuna, the residence of Chief Advisor Muhammad Yunus, to push their three-point demand.

Subsequently, a scuffle broke out between police and the students, forcing the latter to retreat to Shahbagh, Bangladesh's leading Bengali daily Prothom Alo reported.

Earlier in the day, as the demonstration began, the protesting students occupied the main road at Shahbagh as part of their previously announced “March to Dhaka” programme.

According to the Shahbagh Police Station Officer-in-Charge (OC) Khalid Mansur, the students took out a procession and occupied the intersection. He added that vehicular movement in the Shahbagh area remained suspended for several hours, causing severe traffic congestion and creating inconveniences to the public.

Students raised slogans such as "No tilling with goats, it will not happen," "Merit, or quota, merit, merit," and "In my golden Bengal, there is no place for inequality."

The protesters called for nationwide solidarity among engineering students and urged students from institutions across the country to join the demonstrations at Shahbagh.

The three-point demands include not allowing diploma engineers to use the word engineer before their name, not promoting diploma engineers to the ninth grade, and that graduate engineers be given opportunities for entry into 10th-grade jobs.

They also blocked the Shahbagh intersection for five hours on Tuesday to realize their three-point demands.

"Yesterday [Tuesday] we presented three demands. But as the interim government did not meet them, we have taken a stricter action today,” Bangladeshi leading daily The Business Standard quoted Rizwan, a protesting student, as saying.

Bangladesh has been gripped with numerous protest movements and extreme lawlessness after the Yunus-led interim government assumed power last August.

--IANS

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