Jahangirnagar University teachers on Tuesday staged a silent procession on the campus protesting against the ‘killing’ of students during the recent unrest centring around the quota reforms movement that sparked a lethal police crackdown across the country.
Under the banner of ‘Teachers’ Community Against Oppression’, a total of 38 JU teachers brought out the procession from the altar of the university’s central Shaheed Minar after masking their faces with red ribbons at about 12:45pm on the day.
The teachers observed a one-minute silence to mourn the deaths of the anti-quota protesters when the procession reached the ‘Chhatra Janata Shaheed Smriti Stambha’—a monument built on the campus to mark the sacrifices of the killed protesters.
The procession again, marched toward the Shaheed Minar, where the teachers held a protest rally.
Speakers at the rally termed the ‘killings’ during the anti-quota movement as the ‘July Massacre’ and demanded the resignation of the government’s top brass—who ordered the use of guns against student protesters.
Addressing the rally, Professor Saed Ferdous of the JU anthropology department said, ‘The anti-quota protest is nothing but a depiction of people raising voices against the incumbent government’s failure to ensure human rights, democracy and hunger-free state.’
Claiming that the country has been turned into an open prison, chairperson of JU philosophy department Professor ASM Anwarullah Bhuiyan said, ‘When the students took to the streets with their logical demands, law enforcers and the government-supported organisations injured ordinary students resisting them.’
Professor Raihan Rhyne of the Philosophy department said, ‘During the War of Independence, the Pakistanis used to arrest and torture the freedom fighters through block raids, this government is also detaining and torturing the agitating students through block raids at midnight.’
Meanwhile, the chairperson of the JU Bangla department Professor Shamima Sultana, the chairperson of environmental sciences Professor Jamal Uddin, Professor Parvin Jolly of the history department and Professor Masud Enan of the archaeology department, among others, addressed the rally.
The speakers at the rally also protested against the wholesale arrest of anti-quota protesters and harassment of the families of the protesters.
They also demanded the release of innocent people who were arrested.
The JU unit of the Student Movement Against Discrimination expressed solidarity with the teachers’ demonstration.