DU students hold demo, alongside Baishakh celebration

A group of Dhaka University students held a silent procession on the campus on Saturday, protesting at police attack on demonstrators demanding quota reform last week.

The students held the protest rally following the Mangal Shuvajarta procession welcoming Bangla new year and also organised a day-long photography exhibition at Teachers-Students Centre.

Dozens of protesters holding various placards asked the authorities concerned to withdraw the cases filed against the students during the quota protests.

"It’s obvious that the police would not have been able to attack Dhaka University students, had the VC and the proctor given permission to enter. It’s a shame they did and the police attacked the students," said Faisal Bari, a 4th-year student.

In front of Institute of Fine Arts, another demonstrator, Fazle Rabbi, was holding placard against ‘intrusion of outsiders into the campus’.

“A student organisation brought mercenaries from outside the campus to intimidate the students. The students now feel insecure as they are being threatened in different ways,” he said.

A lot of photographs that captured different moments of quota protests were put on display outside the TSC auditorium.

Faisal Mahmood, an organiser of the exhibition, said to Prothom Alo, “We have organised the programmes on the occasion of Pahela Baishakh to make sure everyone knows general students still feel insecure days after the protests.”

The exhibition drew attention as well of the crowd on the DU campus, a key point of the Pahela Baishakh gathering over the years.

Nahid Bari, a banker and an ex-student of DU, said the police attack on the 'demonstration with a right cause' is just unacceptable. "So I think Pahela Baishakh is a good occasion to protest at any wrongdoing," he added.