The protesting students of the polytechnic institutes across the country on Wednesday decided to relax their ongoing shutdown movement for the time being and go back to classrooms.
They, however, decided not to participate in other academic activities, including examinations and related processes, until their six-point demand relating to job, promotion and quality higher education, was met.
Under the banner of 鈥楰arigari Chhatra Andolan, Bangladesh鈥� the protesting students announced their decisions at a press briefing held on the Dhaka Polytechnic Institute campus on the day.聽
To press their demands, polytechnic students began their countrywide demonstrations on April 16 by blocking roads, highways and rail tracks that continued till April 22.聽
Later on, from April 29 they went for a campus shutdown programme for an indefinite period under which they shut down the academic activities in all the polytechnic institutes across the country.
Their demands include the cancellation of a High Court verdict that allows the promotion of craft instructors to the post of junior instructor; the cancellation of the opportunity to enrol in the diploma in engineering course at any age; designing a four-year quality curriculum based on the model of the developed world; and taking legal action against the organisations that are appointing diploma engineers in posts belonging to lower than the 10th grade.
The students said that their decision came following a meeting with the Institution of Diploma Engineers, Bangladesh, held at Dhaka Polytechnic Institute on Wednesday morning.
Principals and teachers of different government and non-government polytechnic institutes and representatives of Karigari Chhatra Andolan were present at the meeting.
At the press briefing, held after the meeting, Andolan central representative Md Mashfiq Islam said that representatives from the Institution of Diploma Engineers, Bangladesh requested them to relax the shutdown programme as it was affecting academic activities.
Habibur Rahman, another central representative, said that they were yet to see any visible progress in implementing their demands.
鈥楽till we took these decisions after discussing with the students as they are also concerned about session jams,鈥� he said, adding, 鈥榳e will return to classroom.鈥�
But, he continued, they would keep boycotting other academic activities, including form fill-up for examinations and semester final examinations.聽
Another Andolan representative Jubair Pathowary said their decision to relax their movement came in the interest of the students and to keep the door open for discussion.
鈥業f there is no effective progress we will go for tougher movement,鈥� he added.
The country has 482 polytechnic institutes, according to the Bangladesh Economic Review 2024.
The estimated number of students in the institutes is over 3,00,000, according to the Bangladesh Education Statistics 2022.