Some teachers and students agree that the decrease is because of political unrest, session jams, and indifference of university authorities and lack of sincerity by the teachers.

"We don't have any foreign students in our department," said Farah Amin Shams, a Finance Department.

"There is no full-fledged admissions office for local and foreign students who want to be admitted round the year," said AAMS Arefin Siddique, professor, Department of Mass Communication and Journalism. "The admissions system is not organised. No quotas are reserved for foreign students and there is no provision for rules and regulations for admissions," he added.

"Foreign students do not have to appear for an admission test. All they have to do is fulfill some minimal requirements," he said.

"Most foreign students at the international hall study technical subjects, with only a few taking other subjects," said the professor.

Sunil Kharel, a Nepalese has been studying at the Dhaka Dental College for last four years. He came here through a Nepalese Government Scholarship.

"I wanted to study medicine but there was no suitable university in Nepal," he said.

Arefin Siddiqui said authorities must develop a way by which other countries would get information on DU and the courses and facilities it offers adding that campaigns must be launched to remove the negative image of DU worldwide.

A picture of the positive features of the university including dedicated teachers, bright students, library and laboratory facilities and even the stadium, should be projected, Siddique said.

"If all the public universities make a collective effort to launch such a campaign the number of students would increase immediately," he added.

The university website is not properly constructed. The existing website has never been updated. Website statistics show 36 foreign students in the International Hall, while the actual figure is more than 100 for 65 seats.

Another Inernational Hall resident who is also a DU staff member said that international students lose interest because of session jams.

Sudeep Ray, a Political Science Department student said: "Student and teacher politics have brought discredit to the standard of the university."

"Teachers have turned commercial; they are more interested in teaching in private universities because of the financial advantages they have," Ray said.

Aminur Rahman Majumder, Provost of International Hall, said the reason behind the decreasing number of foreign students is medium of instruction, which is Bangla.

"Tuition fees were increased during the last Vice Chancellor's term. It has increased from US $ 200 to 1200 a year," he said.

Students prefer India or other Saarc countries because of lower tuition fees," he added.

But Samshad Alam from Nepal contradicted the statement. "Tuition fees in other Saarc countries are higher, and studying at DU is cost effective," he said. Alam studies Pharmacy at DU.

Samshad chose DU because of the accessibility to Bangladesh. He also said that his uncle was a student of Rangpur medical college several years ago. It was he who suggested that Samshad studies here.

Palestinian student Salim Hosny Qannita, who studies International Relations, also had his uncle studying at the Institute of Post Graduate Medicine and Research (IPGMR) 30 years back.

Earlier the DU had students from all around the world, mainly from Malaysia, Indonesia, Somalia and Palestine.

But now most students are from the Saarc countries.

A teacher of Arts Faculty, on condition of anonymity said: "The registry office is totally non-cooperative about foreign student admission. I witnessed an incident how the registrar misbehaved with an American-born-Bangladeshi student who came to study at DU, but the registrar was not willing to help her because she did not have the necessary documents."

The registrar did not advise her how to get about the admission formalities and was rude to the girl and her father.

Fayzul Bin Umar, a student of the Political Science Department said that it has now become the habit of the registrar's office to be rude to prospective candidates.

Foreign students help global interaction and are a vital feature in a competitive world, he said.