Glasgow students show their support for Bangladesh

Over a 1000 Bangladeshi students studying at various universities across Glasgow came together for a peaceful vigil in support of those who have face injustice over the last few days in Bangladesh.

It was organised by the British Bangladeshi & Glasgow University Alumni Tushar Ahmed of the Bangladeshi Community of Glasgow who gave a speech to those who assembled on the day. 

The vigil also included members of the Bangladesh Association Glasgow (BAG) & Bangla Centre coming out to show their support. 

BAG also delivered a letter condemning the ongoing violence and brutality in Bangladesh to the Assistant High Commissioner of Bangladesh’s Assistant High Commission in Manchester. 

The letter stated: “We appeal to all for an immediate halt to this escalation of violence, as sanity and calmness must prevail. We offer our deepest condolences to all the families who have lost their near & dear ones in this.

We also urge an immediate judicial enquiry into these deaths with due diligence and justice to these victims. May, we find the path to patience, to restore lasting peace and security to our beloved nation.” 

The recent troubles in Bangladesh began after Ahsan Habib, who spent three days protesting on the streets of Dhaka protesting against what he believes, was a “violent assault” by police and ruling party supporters against common people like him.

The student protests seeking reform of the government’s job quota system have morphed into nationwide violent unrest, with demands for holding the government accountable for the loss of lives over the past week.

On Sunday, the Supreme Court scrapped most of the quotas, saying that 93% of government jobs will now be based on merit. But student leaders have pledged to carry on with the protests, demanding the release of jailed protesters and the resignation of officials, including Home Minister Asaduzzaman Khan, who they say are responsible for the violence.

Recent figures show that 150 people have been killed and over 500 people have been arrested.

More than 70% of the deaths have been reported from Dhaka, where streets are strewn with the remnants of thousands of rounds of tear-gas shells, sound grenades, shotgun pellets, rubber bullets and brick chunks.

Aside from two policemen and two ruling party supporters, all of the deceased are either students or ordinary people.

Student leaders have demanded an apology from Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, who initially defended the quota for veterans and whose party officials dubbed the protesters as “anti-nationals”.

Protesters have called Hasina, who has been in power since 2009, an “autocrat”. The last two elections (2019 and 2024) were marred by vote rigging, widespread irregularities and opposition boycotts.

Asif Nazrul, a professor of law at Dhaka University said: “Of course, the quota reform alone is not sufficient now. So many students and common people have died in this violent protest, which was definitely instigated by government at first. Someone has to take the responsibility for this tragedy.”

As the violence has escalated, the government imposed a curfew from Friday at midnight for an indefinite period, with intermittent gaps of two hours so that people could stock up on essentials.

The government also deployed the army in order to prevent the violence from spreading amid accusations of excessive use of force by the police against protesters. Soldiers were seen patrolling different city points and other districts on Saturday.

However thousands of protesters defied this curfew as they took to the streets with processions, blocked roads and highways and torched tyres and planks of wood across the country and in different parts of the capital.