The authorities on Monday deferred the Rajshahi University Central Students’ Union, hall unions and Senate student representative elections again, citing the ongoing shutdown programme by a section of teachers, officials and employees of the university over ward quota.
It was the sixth time the polls were rescheduled.
According to the new schedule, the elections will be held on October 16 instead of September 25, RUCSU chief election commissioner professor F Nazrul Islam told ¶¶Òõ¾«Æ·.
He said that the commission had decided to defer the polls considering the volatile campus situation.
‘A complete shutdown programme by teachers, officials, and employees for an indefinite period is under way. Many students have already left the campus. Considering all these factors, we have deferred the elections,’ he said.
The decision came when various student panels were staging demonstrations outside the RUCSU election commission office with their separate demands.
The election commission held an emergency meeting on Monday afternoon after several panels urged the body to ensure a conducive atmosphere before holding the polls, sources said.
However, members of Islami Chhatra Shibir-backed Sammilita Shikkharthi Jote panel took position in front of the RUCSU election commission in the evening and staged demonstrations demanding that the elections must be held on the scheduled date, September 25.
The panel’s vice-president candidate, Mostakur Rahman, alleged that vested quarters had conspired to foil the RUCSU polls by reviving the ward quota issue days before the elections.
‘If the polls are not held on September 25, I fear they may not be held at all,’ he said.
Meanwhile, members of the left-leaning student panels and independent candidates also gathered in front of the RUCSU election commission office, demanding a conducive atmosphere on campus before holding the elections.
After a while, leaders and activists of Jatiyatabadi Chhatra Dal also joined the left-leaning student panels with a protest procession with the demand of holding the polls after Durga Puja, the biggest religious festival of the Hindus in Bangladesh.
At one stage, both groups started chanting slogans against one another.
JCD RU unit president Sultan Ahmed Rahi alleged that the current atmosphere was not conducive to a participatory election.
‘The festive mood and voter presence we saw earlier are gone as most students have left for home due to the shutdown being enforced by teachers and officials. We want the polls to be held in a festive environment with maximum turnout,’ he said, urging the commission to ‘read the pulse of students.’
At a press conference in the evening, Jamaat-e-Islami-backed Public University Teachers’ Council’s RU unit president JAM Shoqiulur Rahman said that they at a meeting of the parishad had decided to participate in the RUCSU, hall unions, and Senate student presentative elections on September 25.
Meanwhile, teachers, officials, and employees of the university continued their ‘complete’ shutdown programme for the second day.
They also formed a human chain on Paris Road, demanding exemplary punishment of students allegedly involved in assaulting pro-vice-chancellor (administration) professor Mohammad Main Uddin and two other teachers on Saturday.
Earlier, on September 18, the university authorities reinstated the ward quota facility under the ‘institutional facilities’, sparking widespread agitation.
The crisis deepened on Saturday when students protesting at the authorities’ decision to reinstate the ward quota in admissions scuffled with teachers and officials, leaving the pro-vice-chancellor (administration) effectively besieged in the teachers’ club for hours.
Protesting against the reported physical attack on their fellow colleagues and demanding exemplary actions against students who were involved in the attack, a section of teachers, officials, and employees have been enforcing the shutdown programme since Saturday night.
On January 2, the university, in face of student protest, abolished the ward quota under which the children and grandchildren of its teachers, officers and other employees were allowed admission to 5 per cent reserved seats in undergraduate courses.
In August, a section of teachers, officers and employees began a movement demanding reinstatement of the facility responding to which the authorities on September 18 reinstated the ward quota.