Various political parties, civil society groups, and rights activists have condemned Islami Chhatra Shibirโthe student wing of Jamaat-e-Islamiโfor attacking students who protested the acquittal of death-row convict war criminal ATM Azharul Islam.
The Ganatantrik Odhikar Committee, a pro-government civil society group, on Friday criticised the Appellate Division order and condemned the brutal attack by Chhatra Shibir on students protesting the verdict.
Earlier, Shibir members attacked a Democratic Students’ Alliance procession at Rajshahi University, disrupted opposition programs at Dhaka University, and kicked a female student in Chittagongโa video of which has gone viral.
In a statement, the civil society group said that female students were specifically targeted, and in Sylhet, a female student was repeatedly threatened by Shibir members for speaking out.
The group claimed that the Chhatra League had raised Chhatra Shibir for 15 years. It also called for identifying and prosecuting Chhatra Shibir members involved in attacks on peaceful demonstrations.
In a separate statement issued on Friday, Bangladesh Ganatantrik Chhatra Sangsad (BGCS) said that the attacks were signs of a dangerous political transformation.
It said that in recent times, barbaric behaviour such as violence, incitement, and hatred towards women repeatedly came to the fore in various educational institutions of the country through various platforms operated in the name of Chhatra Shibir or under pseudonyms.
โThe current position of Shibir is completely opposite to the aspirations that the student community had after the historic July mass uprising,โ said BGCS, the student wing of Chief Adviser Muhammad Yunusโ Kingโs party, the Jatiya Nagorik Party or National Citizen Party (NCP).
โShibir is becoming aggressive whenever it sees a different political stance and is collectively practising confusion, unrest, and covert politics on campus. This is against democratic order and the normal education system,โ the statement added.
Earlier, the Left Democratic Alliance, the Rashtra Sangskar Andolon, and the Bangladesh Studentsโ Union issued statements on Wednesday expressing concern. In the statements, the organisations condemned the attacks and demanded justice for war criminals and their affiliates.
The Bangladesh Student Federation, at a press conference on Thursday, said that they attacked programmes at Rajshahi University and in Chittagong in the presence of the police. In Chittagong, when one person was detained for the attack, a mob was created at the police station.
“We strongly condemn and protest these attacks and demand that the attackers be immediately identified and brought to justice,” Federation President Moshiur Rahman Khan Richard said.
The torch procession at Rajshahi University, organised by the Democratic Student Alliance on Tuesday night, came under attack by Chhatra Shibir activists, operating under the banner of the Anti-Shahbagh Unity.
At least 12 people were injured in another attack during a rally in front of the Chittagong Press Club on Wednesday. The attackers snatched and burned banners belonging to the student alliance. Members of Chhatra Shibir and a faction of the Anti-Discrimination Student Movement participated in the attack, again under the same “Anti-Shahbagh Unity” banner.
Shibir blames protesters
Meanwhile, the Dhaka University unit of Chhatra Shibir has accused left-leaning student organisations of trying to disrupt the peaceful, democratic, and co-existential atmosphere on the campus.
In a statement on Thursday, Shibir also expressed a strong reaction against some slogans chanted during the recent demonstration of the leftist organisations over the acquittal of Jamaat leader Azhar.
SM Farhad Hossain, president of the DU Shibir, and Mohiuddin Khan, its secretary, issued the statement to the media. They expressed concern over what they termed “slogans of terrorism” aimed at their organisation.
โFor the past two days, we have observed that the left-leaning organisations are staging demonstrations over the acquittal of ATM Azharul Islam, the first president of Shibirโs DU unit, in a politically motivated case of so-called crimes against humanity. In a democratic country, everyone has the right to protest or voice opinions on any issue, and Chhatra Shibir fully respects this democratic principle,โ the statement read.
Shibir claimed that the leftist demonstrators used slogans reminiscent of the fascist rhetoric used to justify dehumanisation of Shibir members and killing them. Terming those “slogans of terrorism”, they alleged that the slogans reflect a latent vengeful mindset of the leftists to kill the Chhatra Shibir men.
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