PM's quota remark: Students gather at TSC for protest rally
Students started gathering in front of the Raju sculpture near Dhaka University's TSC around 12:20pm today to hold a rally protesting Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's comments during yesterday's speech.
Students from different halls of Dhaka University and affiliated colleges started coming to the venue in procession.
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They chanted slogans such as "Tumi Noi Ami Noi, Razakar Razakar [Neither You Nor Me, Razakar Razakar]" and "Quota na Medha, Medha Medha [Not quota, but merit, merit, merit]".
Meanwhile, several hundred students of Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET) and Eden College joined the protest rally around 1:15pm.
Earlier in the morning, Eden College Chhatra League allegedly barred female students of the college from joining the protest. Later, a group of students from Dhaka College broke the main gate of Eden College and helped the students join the protest, reports our DU correspondent.
Last night, hundreds of students from several public universities, including Dhaka University, took to the streets to protest what they said was a "disparaging comment" by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina earlier in the evening.
The protesters, who have been staging demonstrations across the country demanding reformation of the quota system for the last two weeks, brought out the processions on their respective campuses around 11:00pm.
The protests last night started hours after Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's press conference at Gono Bhaban yesterday.
In response to a journalist's question, Hasina said, "Why is there so much resentment against the Liberation War and the freedom fighters? If the grandchildren of the freedom fighters don't get quotas, then should the grandchildren of razakars [Pakistani collaborators] get quotas? That is my question."
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