Defying the education minister’s directives to call off the strike, the agitating teachers of Jahangirnagar University on Saturday demonstrated on the campus demanding the removal of the vice-chancellor.
They also boycotted classes and examinations, and showed VC Prof Anwar Hossain black flags and also torched his effigy.
Over 150 teachers joined the assembly arranged by General Teachers’ Forum in front of the VC’s residence around 11am while they gave a statement in which some 395 teachers of the university signed demanding his resignation.
Backed by ousted VC Prof Shariff Enamul Kabir and pro-BNP teachers, the forum has been demonstrating against the VC since he took office last year citing allegations of irregularities, but earlier under a different banner.
Later, they raised black flags to show no-confidence towards the VC and torched an effigy in front of the administrative office of the university around 1:15pm.
General Secretary of the forum Prof Kamrul Ahsan said: “We are agitating to save our university from an autocrat VC. We know our students are suffering due to the agitation but we have promised to fill up the loss taking extra classes after the movement.”
On the other hand, Prof Anwar on Saturday went into his office after three working days and attended the meeting of the central admission test management committee.
He said he had not stopped his sit-in programme in front of his house and the agitating teachers were yet to leave the place.
Education Minister Nurul Islam Nahid on October 3 threatened that the government would take legal actions against the agitating teachers if they did not call off their protests. “The teachers are not behaving responsibly. We cannot let the university be destroyed before our eyes,” he told the parliament.
“The behaviour they have been showing is not acceptable. What will the students learn from this?” he said.
The ministry earlier discussed the issues with the agitating teachers and formed an inquiry committee, which has almost finalised the report. According to its outcome, the government would take necessary measures, he said.
Meanwhile, the Upazila Nirbahi Officer of Savar upazila on Saturday visited the university and met both with the VC and the agitating teachers.
UNO Kamrul Hasan Molla told the Dhaka Tribune: “We have come upon the VC’s request to observe the situation of the university as the agitating teachers cannot interrupt the admission committee’s meeting called by the university authorities.”
The teachers told the UNO that they would not interrupt the university activities respecting the High Court order.
“The teachers assured us that they would find out a peaceful solution to bring back normalcy. We will take steps following directives of the authorities in this regard,” UNO Kamrul added.
Prof Md Hanif Ali, convener of the Forum, claimed that they were agitating following the rules and regulation.
VC Prof Anwar Hossain told journalists that the magistrate informed the teachers that what they were doing were illegal.
