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The main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party on Monday strongly condemned and protested at the attack on the anti-quota agitators.

In a statement, BNP secretary general Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir said, ‘This violent attack is due to the fear of losing power. The country’s people witness a scene of suppressing the legitimate demands of the students in a bloody manner to stay in power will go down in history as another violent chapter of the Awami fascism. People, state, society, independence, sovereignty are never safe in their hands.’

Fakhrul said about the attack on the students who were in the field demanding quota reform, ‘The Awami League has burst in raptures from their (fake) heroism as they have shed the blood of the students with the police and their armed gangs.’

He said that the AL wanted to silence the people by resorting to terrible methods of repression.

‘The Awami government is running a steamroller on the movement of pro-democracy political parties, in the same way, it has taken the approach of suppressing the ongoing movement of general students,’ he said, adding that the police and Chhatra League jointly attacked the students of various universities and educational institutions, including those of Dhaka University.

The government lost its control in the turbulent street movement of the students of universities, schools and colleges across the country, for the just demand of quota reform. That is why the state power mercilessly suppressed the movement, which is the tradition of the Awami League, he said.

Fakhrul alleged that the Awami League government endlessly deceived the general students about quota, and said, ‘It is the tradition of the Awami League to deceive the people. The prime minister of the illegal government, after cancelling the quota in 2018, reinstated it in a different manner this year.’

Earlier on the day, following separate liaison committee meetings with Bangladesh Student Rights Protection Council and a faction of the Gono Odhikar Parishad at BNP chairperson’s Gulshan office, BNP standing committee member Amir Khasru Mahmud Chowdhury at a press conference said that the government was pushing the nation towards division without solving the quota issue in government jobs.

‘A logical solution to this problem is very simple if there is a government elected by the people. But this unelected government is leading the country towards division without walking the path of solution,’ Khasru said.

‘The outsiders attacked the agitators on the Dhaka University campus, and the government is pushing the country towards division without solving the quota issue,’ he said, adding that attacking the agitators would not solve the quota issue.

Khasru protested at the filing of a case against the protesting students and condemned the attack on them.

‘The government is in favour of the quota system because of its vested interest,’ he said, adding that even if the quota system was abolished, politicisation would continue to prevent talented people from being recruited in the government jobs.