Authorities in Bangladesh have imposed a nationwide curfew in the wake of the deadly unrest that has spread across the country.
The clashes between student protestors and police have led to the deaths of at least 105 people, according to news agency AFP’s count of deceased reported by hospitals.
This poses the toughest political challenge for Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, Bangladesh’s longest-serving leader, as students are demanding reforms to the government’s existing quota policy on jobs.
In a televised address to the nation, PM Sheikh Hasina invited the students for talks to find a solution to the issue peacefully. However, given the existing situation, it is not clear whether the students will accept the government’s offer.
Bangladesh Unrest
Setting the narrative over Bangladesh’s unrest, Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal stated on Friday that it is an “internal” matter of the country. However, there are around 15,000 Indians, including 8,500 students, currently residing in Bangladesh, who, as per the MEA spokesperson, are all safe. So far, the government has facilitated the return of 245 Indian citizens, including 125 students.
The student protestors stormed a prison in the central Bangladeshi district of Narsingdi and released hundreds of inmates before setting the facility on fire, a police official told AFP. “I don’t know the number of inmates, but it would be in the hundreds,” he stated.
The demonstrators are demanding that the Bangladesh government stop setting aside 30 percent of government jobs for the families of people who fought in the 1971 war of independence from Pakistan.
Meghalaya Chief Minister Conrad Sangma has stated that as many as 63 students from the state safely returned from Bangladesh. He also said he was in constant touch with the Indian High Commission in Bangladesh to evacuate more students from there.
The Chief Minister said that the state government is planning to create a portal where students from Meghalaya studying abroad can register themselves. “If any emergency arises, we will be able to contact them and help them as we have the information,” he said.
The protest took an ugly turn after agitated demonstrators barged into the country’s state broadcaster and set the facility on fire. On Friday, the websites of several Bangladesh newspapers faced trouble, did not update, and were also inactive on social media, news agency Reuters reported.
News television channels and the state broadcaster BTV abruptly went off the air, while entertainment channels continued normal operations. Several of the affected news channels displayed messages citing technical issues and assured viewers that programming would resume shortly.
The official websites of the central bank, the prime minister’s office, and the police were reportedly hacked by a group identifying itself as “THE R3SISTANC3,” according to news agency Reuters.
“Operation HuntDown, Stop Killing Students,” read messages flashing on the websites, adding in crimson letters: “It’s not a protest anymore, it’s a war now.”
The United States also condemned the violence. Addressing the media, the state department spokesman Vedant Patel stated, “We need to make sure that any kind of freedom of expression is happening safely and people are free from violence. That’s something we’re continuing to pay close attention to,” Bloomberg reported.
“Our protest will continue,” Sarwar Tushar, who joined the protest, and sustained minor injuries when it was violently dispersed by the police, told news agency AFP.
“We want the immediate resignation of Sheikh Hasina. The government is responsible for the killings,” he stated.
The protesters stated that the existing job quota system is framed to benefit the supporters of Sheikh Hasina’s Awami League, which led the independence movement. Calling it a discriminatory system, the demonstrators wanted to replace it with a meri-based system. Though the Bangladesh government scrapped these quotas in 2018, a High Court reinstated them later.
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has called for restraint from all parties involved and urged authorities to thoroughly investigate all acts of violence and ensure that the perpetrators are held accountable.