42 JU students get bail

Staff Correspondent: A court in Dhaka on Sunday granted bail to 42 students of Jahangirnagar University (JU), who were picked up while protesting a road crash that left two of their fellows dead on Friday.

Ashulia police produced the students before the court of Addition Chief Judicial Magistrate Mostafizur Rahman in connection with a vandalism case in the afternoon. The court passed the bail order after their lawyer moved separate petitions seeking bail in the case.

Earlier in the day, they were shown arrested in a case filed on charges of vandalising Vice-Chancellor’s residence.

Authorities closed Jahangirnagar University for an indefinite period on Saturday night as its students burst into protests over the death of two fellow students in a road crash on Dhaka-Aricha Highway.

The university authorities took the decision at an emergency syndicate meeting called by JU Vice-Chancellor Prof Farzana Islam on Saturday night asking its residential students to leave their halls.

The authorities shut the university after over a hundred students vandalised Vice Chancellor Farzana Islam's residence demanding action against those who attacked them during their demonstration on the Dhaka-Aricha highway protesting the death of the two students, the meeting sources said.

The residential students vacated their dormitories by 10:00am on Sunday.

Nazmul Hasan Rana, a student of 43rd batch of Marketing Department, and Arafat, a student of Microbiology Department, were killed as a bus knocked them down in C&B area on the highway around 5 am on Friday.

Following the incident, the university students put up a barricade on the busy highway from 11:00am to 5:00pm on Saturday, demanding the immediate arrest of the killer driver and bringing him to justice.

At one stage, police swooped on the agitated students to disperse the gathering which triggered a clash, leaving at least 20 people, including the JU chief security officer, students and journalists injured.

Later, the demonstrating students laid a siege to the VC's residence and carried out vandalism there.

They also swooped on the teachers when they were trying to prevent them from vandalising the VC's residence, leaving at least 10 teachers injured.

During the incident, the university authorities called in police to bring the situation under control. Police then arrested some 42 unruly from the VC's residence at midnight.

The University administration filed a case with Ashulia Police Station against a group of rowdy students on charge of assaulting teachers and carrying out vandalism.

Meanwhile, the residential students were seen leaving their dormitories within the stipulated time.

Additional law enforcers have been deployed on the campus to fend off any further trouble.

risingbd/DHAKA/May 28, 2017/Mamun Khan/Amirul