Students from seven public colleges located in the capital have threatened they would enforce “tough demonstrations” if an ordinance on the dedicated “Dhaka Central University” is not issued by Monday.
Abdur Rahman, a student of Dhaka College, issued the warning at a press conference hosted in front of the college Shaheed Minar on Thursday.
The government has been working to finalise the ordinance, but a group of college teachers are abruptly trying to interrupt the process, the student protesters alleged at the press conference.
The warning from students follows an apparently counter demonstration staged by hundreds of teachers on Wednesday, calling for a review of the process to form a full-fledged dedicated university for the seven colleges.
The students alleged the teachers are conspiring against a full-fledged dedicated university at the final moment “violating their job regulations.” The protesting teachers should be “penalized,” the students said as they vowed to resist all “conspiracies.”
At the press conference, some students alleged that “officials” are threatening to under-evaluate exam scripts if the students do not abandon their protest plans.
On Wednesday, the teachers, led by Eden Mohila College Professor Mahfil Ara Begum, formed a human chain in front of the University Grants Commission (UGC) office at Agargaon, calling on the government to scrap the process for establishing a full-fledged “Dhaka Central University.”
The name of the proposed university may be retained, but it’s structure needs revisions, the teachers claimed at the human chain. A full-fledged central university will shrink the educational capacities existing in the seven colleges, while diminishing their historic heritage.
Instead, the government should form a central campus and affiliated the seven colleges with it in order to utilise the existing facilities, they suggested.
The proposed university would ignore the role of laboratories and other infrastructure in the seven colleges. It would also shrink the opportunity for women to seek higher education by downgrading the existing roles of Eden Mohila College and Begum Badrunnesa Government Girls’ College.
