At least 100 people were injured in a clash between rival students in Bangladesh on Monday as protesters against government job quotas clashed with party-aligned counterprotesters, according to police.
Witnesses and police reported that hundreds of students supporting the ruling Awami League party and anti-quota demonstrators engaged in hours-long fighting on the campus of Dhaka University, hurling rocks, striking each other with iron rods, and fighting with sticks. According to witnesses, some threw petrol bombs, while others carried machetes.
More than half of the highly paid civil service positions, which amount to hundreds of thousands of government jobs, are reserved under the quota system for particular groups, such as the offspring of heroes from the nation’s 1971 liberation war against Pakistan. Mostajirur Rahman, the chief of the local police station, informed the media that “they clashed with sticks and threw rocks at each other.
In January, Hasina, 76, won the general election for the fourth time in a row. Her opponents, who boycotted the poll, saw a severe crackdown. The vote was held without the participation of any legitimate opposition parties. 26-year-old injured student Shahinur Shumi claimed the demonstrators were caught off guard.
She stated from her hospital bed at Dhaka Medical Hospital, “We were peacefully conducting our procession.”
“Suddenly, the Chhatra League (the ruling party student wing) attacked us with sticks, machetes, iron rods, and bricks.
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