Now JU students demand ban on hall politics

A section of Jahangirnagar University (JU) students staged a demonstration protesting the announcement of hall committees by the university unit of Jatiyatabadi Chhatra Dal, the student wing of the BNP.

They demanded a complete ban on the political activities inside the halls and dissolution of the newly formed JCD committees.

The demonstration began hours after Dhaka University authorities banned all forms of hall-level student politics.

Chanting slogans like "direct action against hall politics" and "One, two, three, four - hall politics no more," the JU students from Tazuddin Ahmad Hall brought out a procession and marched through several halls around 9:00pm.

Students from others dormitories also joined the procession that stopped in front of the vice-chancellor's residence.

However, they left the VC residence one hour after VC Prof Mohammad Kamrul Ahsan gave them assurance of holding talks on their demands during today's academic council meeting.

The VC also told the students that a policy decision might be taken in the meeting.

The protesters placed total six demands that include banning all forms of hall politics, introducing punitive measures against those involved in political activities inside hall, ragging and guest room culture, holding hall council elections, distributing political gifts only through hall authorities, preventing external interference in hall affairs, and taking action against the students who overstay.

Shariful Islam Sakib, student of the Biotechnology and Genetic Engineering department, said, "If hall politics returns, so will guest rooms, ragging, and dominance-based politics."

Another protester, Shakil Ahmed from the history department, warned that if all student organisations do not abolish their hall committees immediately, they will escalate their movement.