5 killed and dozens injured in Bangladesh in violent clashes over government jobs quota

DHAKA, Bangladesh (AP) —

At least five people were reported killed and dozens injured in Bangladesh on Tuesday as student protests against a government jobs quota led to violence around the country, media reports said.

Student protesters clashed with pro-government student activists and with police, and violence was reported around the capital of Dhaka, the southeastern city of Chattogram and the northern city of Rangpur. At least three of the dead were students, one was a pedestrian and one was not identified, media reports said, citing officials.

Protesters are demanding an end to a quota reserved for family members of veterans who fought in Bangladesh’s war of independence in 1971, which allows them to take up to 30% of government jobs.

They argue the quota is discriminatory, and should be replaced with a merit-based system. They also say it benefits supporters of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, whose Awami League party led the independence movement. Ruling party leaders accuse the opposition of backing the protests.

Clashes broke out Monday at the country’s leading Dhaka University, with more than 100 students injured, police said. Violence spread overnight to Jahangir Nagar University in Savar, outside Dhaka, and was reported elsewhere around the country on Tuesday.

Bengali-language Prothom Alo daily reported that one person died in Dhaka and three others, including the pedestrian, in Chattogram. Media reports also said that a 22-year-old protester died in Rangpur. Details of the deaths could not be confirmed immediately.

While job opportunities have expanded in Bangladesh’s private sector, many people prefer government jobs because they are seen as stable and lucrative. Each year, some 3,000 such jobs open up to nearly 400,000 graduates.

Hasina defended the quota system Tuesday, saying that the veterans — commonly known as “freedom fighters” — should receive the highest respect for their sacrifice in 1971 regardless of their current political affiliation.

“Abandoning the dream of their own life, leaving behind their families, parents and everything, they joined the war with whatever they had,” she said during an event at her office in Dhaka.

At Jahangir Nagar University early Tuesday, violence broke out when protesters gathered at the vice chancellor’s residence. Demonstrators accused the Bangladesh Chhatra League, a student wing of the Awami League, of attacking their protests. Local media reports said police and ruling party-backed students attacked the protesters.

But Abdullahil Kafi, a senior police official, told the country’s leading English-language newspaper, Daily Star, that protesters attacked police and that officers retaliated with tear gas and blank rounds. He said up to 15 police officers were injured.

More than 50 people were treated at Enam Medical College Hospital near Jahangir Nagar University as the violence continued for hours, hospital medical officer Ali Bin Solaiman said. He said at least 30 of the victims suffered pellet wounds.

Protesters also blocked highways and railways in Dhaka and elsewhere across the country.

Swapon, a Dhaka University student protester who gave only his first name, said students want a “rational” reform of the quota program. He said that if he can’t find a job after studying for six years, “it will cause me and my family to suffer.”

Protesters have said they are apolitical, but ruling parties have accused opposition parties of backing the demonstrations for political gain.

A ruling party-backed student activist at Dhaka University, who declined to give his name, told The Associated Press that protesters and militant supporters of the opposition’s Bangladesh Nationalist Party and Jamaat-e-Islami party had vandalized rooms in student dormitories.

The quota system had temporarily been halted following a court order after mass student protests in 2018. But last month, Bangladesh’s High Court nullified that decision, reinstating the quota system once more, angering scores of students and triggering protests.

Last week, the Supreme Court suspended the High Court’s order for four weeks, and the chief justice asked protesting students to return to classes, saying the court would issue a decision in four weeks. However, the protests have continued daily.

The quota system also reserves government jobs for women, disabled people and ethnic minority groups, but students have only protested against jobs reserved for veterans’ families.

Prime Minister Hasina maintained power in an election in January that was boycotted by opposition parties due to Hasina’s refusal to step down and allow a caretaker government to oversee the election.

Her Awami League party, under her father Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, led the independence war with the help of India. Rahman was assassinated along with many family members in a military coup in 1975.

In 1971, the Jamaat-e-Islami party -- which shared power with the Bangladesh Nationalist Party led by Hasina’s archrival, former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia, in 2001-2006 — openly opposed the independence war. It formed groups that helped the Pakistani military fight pro-independence forces.

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Associated Press video journalist AL Emrun Garjon contributed to the report.