Dhaka (The Brussels Morning Newspaper) – Huge demonstrations across Bangladesh escalated into lethal violence this week with disagreements between students, pro-government proponents and armed police fueling widespread outrage over civil service job quotas opponents express are discriminatory.
Dozens of people have reportedly been extinguished and hundreds wounded in the violence, which has witnessed riot police employ tear gas and rubber bullets against protesters and groups of demonstrators armed with bars filling the streets and university campuses in the capital Dhaka and other cities.
State broadcaster Bangladesh Television (BTV) was off the air on Friday after student protestors allegedly put fire to its headquarters, according to local media, and protesters have called for a national shutdown in a significant challenge to the administration of longstanding Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.
Why Are Students Protesting in Bangladesh?
Many Bangladeshi pupils are urging an end to the government’s quota system, which accumulates more than half of civil service posts for specific groups. About 30% of those highly sought-after positions are reserved for families of veterans who battled in Bangladesh’s war of independence from Pakistan in 1971.
How Are Job Quotas Impacting Bangladesh Youth?
Many of the country’s current political elite are connected to that generation – including Prime Minister Hasina, a daughter of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the widely considered founder of modern Bangladesh who was killed in 1975. The reserved functions are linked to job security and more elevated pay, and protesters express the quota system is prejudiced and favours partners of Hasina’s ruling Awami League party. They are pressing recruitment based on merit.
How Is Bangladesh’s Economic Situation Affecting Protests?
Pushing the anger is high unemployment ranks in the country, particularly among young people. Bangladesh has witnessed strong economic growth under Hasina, but it has stalled in the post-pandemic period and, as the World Bank reports in its latest overview, inequality has “widened in urban areas.” In a country of 170 million people, more than 30 million are not in employment or education.
In 2018, the quota system was discarded following alike protests but in June the High Court reinstated it, judging its removal as unconstitutional. On July 10, the Supreme Court discontinued the quotas for one month while it took up the case. Analysts and protesters say the quota system makes a two-tier Bangladesh where a politically linked elite benefits from their birth.
What Sparked the Deadly Protests in Dhaka?
The protests started at the prestigious Dhaka University on July 1 and later extended to other campuses and cities nationwide in almost everyday street assemblages that included rail and road blocking. The demonstrations evolved violently on July 15 when components of the Bangladesh Chatra League – the student branch of the ruling Awami League party – reportedly struck student protesters inside the Dhaka University campus.
Since then, disagreements between security forces, protesters and government advocates have escalated, with Bangladesh deploying its paramilitary Rapid Action Battalion, which was sanctioned by the United States in 2021 after “widespread allegations of grave human rights abuses.” Authorities have also been forced to thwart online communications. Internet monitoring site Netblocks affirmed a “near-total national internet shutdown” across Bangladesh on Thursday.
How Hasina’s Remarks Enflamed Student Protests?
Hasina has declared a judicial investigation into the slayings and called on protesters to await the judgment of the Supreme Court. “I especially urge everyone to wait patiently until the Supreme Court verdict comes. I believe our students will get justice from the high court, they will not be disappointed,” Hasina said.
However, she has been indicted of enflaming protesters’ anger by reportedly naming them “razakar,” an offensive term utilised for those who allegedly cooperated with the Pakistani army during the 1971 independence war. “We anticipated an apology from our prime minister for resembling us to traitors of 1952 and 1972, and a solid solution to quota reform,” stated protester Salman Farsi. “What did the students do to deserve this tag?”
Student protesters CNN communicated to say their demonstrations have gone beyond frustration over the quota system and their offence is now directed at Hasina and her government, which human rights organizations have long cautioned are headed toward a one-party system. “This is a people’s movement against the authoritarian government,” Hossain stated.
“This is not just about quota protests anymore, this is much bigger than that, in simple quota protests the government wouldn’t go around hurting and shooting students. This shows the current fascist and autocratic nature of the government, which has been upholding the power without any proper voting system.”
