Over 100 government primary school teachers were injured as the police charged batons, hurled sound grenades and sprayed water on their procession demanding a pay hike in the capital鈥檚 Shahbagh area Saturday afternoon.
The teachers faced the police action in front of the Shahbagh Police station when they had been trying to breach a police barricade there on their way to Shahbagh intersection from the Central Shaheed Minar on the Dhaka University campus.
Following the police action, the agitating assistant teachers announced work abstention at all government primary schools across the country and sit-in at the Central Shaheed Minar in Dhaka for an indefinite period from today.
The assistant teachers were staging the demonstration to press home their three demands, including upgradation of their pay scale to the 10th grade from 13th grade, ensuring 100 per cent departmental promotion, and resolving issues related to higher-grade eligibility after 10 and 16 years of service.
The teachers, under the banner of Prathomik Shikkhok Dabi Bastabayan Parishad, began their pre-scheduled sit-in at the Central Shaheed Minar Saturday morning.
They, minutes after 3:00pm, brought out a procession from there in a bid to go to Shahbagh intersection to hold a symbolic 鈥榩en drop鈥� programme there.
The police, however, intercepted the procession by putting barricades in front of Shahbagh police station, where the protesters sat on the road.
The police claimed that they had to take action when聽 a group of protesters tried to breach the barricade minutes after 3:45pm.
They said that they sprayed water using water cannons, charged batons and hurled sound grenades to disperse the protesters.
The protesting teachers claimed that more than 200 teachers were injured in the 鈥榩olice attack on their peaceful demonstration鈥�.
Shahbagh police station officer-in-charge Khalid Mansur said that at least six police personnel, including Dhaka Metropolitan Police鈥檚 Ramna division deputy commissioner Masud Alam, were injured as protesters hurled brick bats at them.
After the police action, a leader of the protesting teachers, Abul Kashem, announced that they would not leave the sit-in venue at the Central Shaheed Minar until fulfilling their demands.
He, going back to the Central Shaheed Minar, announced an indefinite work abstention at all government primary schools across the country.
Claiming that over 200 teachers were injured in the police attack, he demanded justice and punishment for the involved police personnel.
The Dhaka Medical College Hospital police outpost in-charge, inspector Md Faruk, said that at least 110 injured protesters took primary treatment at the emergency department of DMCH.
DC Masud said that a group of teachers informed the police that they would return to the Central Shaheed Minar but another group broke the barricades and hurled brick bats at the police.
鈥楽ome of our officers are injured. We dispersed them following the due process of the law,鈥� said Masud.
Shahbagh OC Khalid said that they, during dispersing the protesters, picked up five teachers for interrogation, said OC Khalid.
