Sylhet Cadet College authorities forced 50 students who left the campus allegedly because of torture to return to the college on Saturday night.
Witnesses and the police said about 50 college students left the campus about 9:00pm on Saturday night and started marching towards the city.
The authorities stopped the students at Khasdabir, about 4km off the college, with the help of the police, the sources said.
The students told local people present there that two teachers had continued tortured them for about five hours from 3:00pm on Saturday.
They claimed they wanted to inform the media of the matter and they would be tortured further if they would go back to the campus, local people quoted the students as saying.
Local city ward councillor Farhad Chowdhury Shamim told New Age he was on the spot at night when the authorities forced the students to get back to the campus.
‘The students refused to return to the campus saying they were physically tortured beyond tolerance and the authorities would torture them again if they returned,’ the ward councillor said.
The authorities, however, forced the students to get into college buses, which had reached the place by the time, and managed to take them back to the campus by 10:45pm.
None of the Sylhet Cadet College authorities could be reached over telephone on Sunday for comments on the incident despite repeated dialling to college principal’s office number.
The Kotwali police officer-in-charge, Nawroz Ahmed, told New Age on Sunday the college authorities could take the students back to the campus with the help of the police.
The Ambarkhana outpost in-charge, Salauddin, told New Age the college authorities managed to take the students back to the campus after assuring them of looking into the matter of torture on students.
The education minister, Nurul Islam Nahid, told New Age on Sunday night over mobile that he was not aware of the matter.
‘Such an issue of torture on the students by a cadet college teacher is unwarranted. I will look into the matter after contacting the authorities concerned,’ the minister said.
The High Court on July 19 ordered the government to stop all kinds of corporal punishments in educational institutions.
The court passed the order after hearing a public interest litigation writ petition filed by rights organisation Bangladesh Legal Aid and Services Trust and Ain o Salish Kendra.
