BCL pours blood before principal's room to ban Shibir

Bangladesh Chhatra League (BCL) activists of Chittagong College yesterday collected blood from among themselves and poured it in front of the principal's office, demanding that the campus be made free of Islami Chhatra Shibir.

Principal Jesmin Akter was inside her office at that time.

Following a two-week winter vacation, the college reopened yesterday, amid fears of violence, and no classes were held because few students were present, said college officials.

During Victory Day celebrations last year, a clash broke out after Shibir activists attacked BCL men when the latter were laying wreaths at the Shaheed Minar on the campus.

Former and current BCL leaders earlier say the Jamaat-e-Islami backed student body established supremacy in the college in the 1980s, and BCL observed Victory Day on the campus for the first time under its banner after nearly three decades.

Around a hundred BCL men gathered at the Shaheed Minar yesterday, and restated their eight demands including setting up a permanent police camp on the campus, keeping all gates of the college shut except the main entrance, withdrawing the hostel superintendents and imams of the college mosques, withdrawing all part-time staff, and removing all shops on the campus.

At a press conference on Thursday, the BCL leaders announced the demands and urged the authorities not to reopen the college before meeting those.

They also submitted a memorandum to the prime minister on the same day through the deputy commissioner of Chittagong, requesting her intervention.

Talking to The Daily Star on Thursday, Nurul Azim Rony, general secretary of Chittagong city BCL, said, “Shibir goons have been employed as part-time staff in the college, and they also established shops on the campus.”

“The hostel superintendents and the imams patronise Shibir,” he added.

Principal Jesmin Akter said she could not make any decision unilaterally. “I have come to know about their demands today and I can't give any decision instantly…we have a system,” she said, adding, “The academic council will decide everything."