Rajshahi University teachers and students on Saturday demanded that the government and the authorities concerned should withdraw the cases filed against the university students in connection with the August 2007 campus protests.
Campus protests began on August 20 with Dhaka University students taking to the streets demanding removal of army camp from the university gymnasium after a few army men had beaten up three students in the ground.
The protests spilled over to other places, especially the universities, on August 22 and the ordered ordered curfew in metropolitan cities and closed the universities and colleges on the day. Two hundred people, most students, were injured in clashes between the students and the army men and the police in Dhaka in August 20-22.
The teachers and students on Saturday put forth the demands at a human chain organised by Kendriya Sangskritik Jote, a combine of 15 university-based cultural groups, about11:00am on the campus.
Several cases were filled against RU teachers and students on charges of getting involved in violent protests and burning a vehicle of the Directorate General of Forces Intelligence and attack on policemen, the speakers said.
They said that cases were still pending against 13 students of the university and other cases filed against the teachers and some other studetns were withdrawan, they added, urging the government to withdraw the cases immediately.
They said that as the students were still accused in the cases, they found it difficult to get government jobs and were denied some other opportunities.
The talked about how the military and the police carried out repression against the teachers and students and demanded that the people responsible for the repression against the teachers and students on the campus and in jail should be punished.
The Teachers and Students’ Cultural Centre director, Sujit Sarker, the university unit Chhatra Union president Rafi Ahmed Chanchal, Kendriya Sangskritik Jote president Apurbo Krishna Chhakravarty and Anushilan Natyadal vice-president Jewel Rana spoke.
Sujit Sarker said that lawmen had tortured teachers and students on August 22 in the university when teachers and students were holding a peaceful procession in protest at three students being beaten on the Dhaka University campus.
Referring to the cases of Limon, who was shot at by the Rapid Action Battalion, and Abdul Kader, who was beaten up by the police, Sujit said that the law enforcers kept committing such crimes.
Amanullah Sarker Roni, one of the accused in the cases, demanded withdrawal of all false cases against the students so that they could lead normal life.
-With New Age input
