Jagannath University students on Tuesday withdrew their movement for the construction of the university鈥檚 second campus by Bangladesh Army, after the interim government accepted their demands.
The students made the announcement after meeting the adviser for the ministries of education and planning, Wahiduddin Mahmud, and Nahid Islam, adviser to the ministries of posts, telecommunications and information technology and information and broadcasting.
Terming the situation as a misunderstanding, Wahiduddin Mahmud said that there was no need for this movement for realising the demands as the solutions were very easy.
鈥榃e (the education ministry) will assist the university to complete the work of the second campus by the army,鈥� he added after the meeting held at the education ministry.
Several hundreds of students besieged the secretariat for around three hours to press home their five-point demand on Monday afternoon.
The demands were bringing the project director, liable for construction of the university鈥檚 second campus, under legal accountability and transferring the work to Bangladesh Army within seven days, an official statement of the education ministry on the handover of the construction work, immediate acquisition of the remaining 11 acres of land for campus expansion, cancellation of all contracts signed during the previous 鈥榓uthoritarian鈥� government concerning the old campus, inclusion of the university under the University Grants Commission鈥檚 pilot project and allocation of an annual budget of minimum Tk聽500 crore for the university.
The construction of the university鈥檚 second campus is under implementation in two phases.
On Tuesday, JnU vice-chancellor professor Md Rezaul Karim, treasurer Professor Sabina Sharmin, Proctor professor Tazammul Haque, two movement organisers AKM Rakib and Tausib Mahbub Sohan, and the officials from the University Grants Commission and the ministry were present at the meeting.
After the meeting, Wahiduddin Mahmud told the reporters that he had already approved the first phase of the project and the plan for the second phase is now with the Executive Committee of National Economic Council.
Expressing solidarity with the students鈥� demands, he said that he ordered probing into the project to find out the responsible people for the delay.
About other demands, the adviser added that these could be solved by the university administration by itself.
Later, AKM Rakib told reporters that they had initiated the movement since last week with the demand of handing over the work of the second campus to the army.
He mentioned that the first phase of the project had started in 2018 which was scheduled to be completed by 2020.
鈥楾he ministry accepted our first demand for sacking the corrupted project director,鈥� Rakib said, adding, 鈥榳ithin today our university administration will send a letter to the UGC for sacking the project director.鈥�
For completing the first phase and later the second phase, army officials would be involved, while the works of land acquisition, temporary residential facilities and increased budget would be checked soon too, he said.聽
鈥楢s the government fulfilled our demands and expressed solidarity with us, we are withdrawing our movement,鈥� Rakib said and added that they wanted the involvement of the army for transparency and quality works.
抖阴精品 correspondent in Jagannath University reported that after the meeting, the students blocked access to the administrative building on the university campus and stopped faculty buses on various routes protesting at the administration鈥檚 reluctance to fulfil their demands and failure to formally request for the support of the ministry.
Around 4:30pm, the vice-chancellor and other officials met the students in the vice-chancellor鈥檚 conference room.
Nearly after two and a half hours, the administration promised to initiate temporary housing construction for students within three months and issue a written order on the meeting.
Tausib Mahbub Sohan said that it was their internal meeting while they were stick to the decision of withdrawing their movement from Tuesday.
