Protest over fellows’ death: 42 Jahangirnagar University students get bail

Forty-two students of Jahangirnagar University today got bail after they were produced before a Dhaka court in connection with a vandalism case.

They were picked up by law enforcers yesterday while protesting death of their two fellows in a road crash on Friday and shown arrested in a vandalism case today. 

Police produced them before the court of Addition Chief Judicial Magistrate Mostafizur Rahman in the afternoon. The court passed the bail order after their lawyer moved separate petitions seeking bail in the case.

JU Registrar Abu Bakkar filed the case with Ashulia Police Station this morning against 50 people mentioning names of 30 accused, bringing allegation that the students have carried out vandalism on the campus during the agitation.

ASK, ex-JU students concerned over detention

Meanwhile, rights body Ain O Salish Kendra, in a statement, today expressed its concerns over the yesterday’s detention of the students.

It observed that the attacks from ruling party’s student front Bangladesh Chhatra League and police on the student rally, and detention of the protesters will affect the proper solution to the existing situation.  

The statement, signed by ASK Executive Director Sheepa Hafiza, also called upon the government to take legal steps to avert such incidents in future.

Besides, a group of former students of JU today placed five-point demand including unconditional release of the accused students.

The students, teamed up as Jahangirnagar against Repression, also called upon the authorities concerned to meet the agitating students’ demands including compensation for families of the two victims, who killed in a road accident yesterday.

They also asked the JU authorities not to vacate residential halls “whimsically”.

Earlier in the day, the residential students of the university left their dormitories after the authorities last night asked them to vacate halls by around 10:00 am today.

The university authorities took the decision at an emergency syndicate meeting called by JU Vice-Chancellor Prof Farzana Islam last night after students took position inside her residence compound by breaking the lock of the front gate, said JU Registrar Abu Bakr Siddique.

The students laid siege to the VC's residence, next to the teachers' quarters, demanding punishment for the BCL men who earlier attacked them while they were protesting deaths of two fellows in Friday's road accident blocking the Dhaka-Aricha highway.