N’ganj teacher humiliation: Demand for arrest of Salim Osman

People from cross sections of life today demanded the immediate arrest of Narayanganj lawmaker Salim Osman for humiliating a school headmaster.

They also demanded arrest of members of the school managing committee on the same ground.

Salim Osman and members of the school’s managing committee will have to be booked for trial to avoid inception of any similar incident, speakers demanded while addressing a rally of writers, publishers, teachers, students and leaders of different cultural organisations in Dhaka this afternoon.

On May 8, Shyamal Kanti Bhakta, headmaster of Piyar Sattar Latif High School in Bandar area, was beaten up by a mob and made to do sit-ups holding his ears. In the video footage that went viral later, Salim Osman MP from Jatiya Party was seen forcing the teacher to squat and apologise before the crowd.

Protesting the incident, several cultural organisations staged the rally at Shahbagh intersection today to voice their demands.

Blaming Salim Osman for insulting the teacher, Shishir Chakrabarti, organising secretary of Bangladesh Juba Union demanded his immediate arrest.

All the members of the school’s managing committee will have to be booked for trial so that nobody dares to demean a teacher in the future, he added.

Avinna Kibria Islam, a teacher of Jessore Science and Technology University, said all the people responsible for humiliating the Narayanganj teacher would have to be tried so that none repeat this sort of behaviour in the future.

The speakers also underscored the need for adequate security of Shyamal and his family.

Later, protesters burned an effigy of Selim Osman.