#Quota Movement

[meadow-art]

This is my message from Bangladesh

i'm sorry but this is going to be political, but my country's students are currently at war with the government. beleive it or not, we are being mowed down with bullets in our own country, only because we spoke up about our rights about equality in job sectors. they are killing students of ALL AGE, when i say that i mean from kindergarteners to university students. what started as a peaceful protest about the quota system of our country soon turned into a blood bath, all because the govt leaders ordered the specific section of students under them to attack the protesting students, more that 50 students have alr died and more are being hunted down and killed. and now they have deployed police forces.

PLEASE, please respond to our calls, spread this news as fast as you can. they are turning off mobile data nation wide, and i'm currently using a vpn to post this. my hands are shaking and there's gunshots outside my window. no student are safe, people i know have been shot in the chest for joining protests.

being at war with my own country's leaders was not something i would've thought of happenning even 5 days ago, but here i am holed up in my room refreshing my feed with shaking hands just get news of more of my brothers dying.

i'm sorry this isnt what i post usually, but i cant right now, the martyrs had so much to live for, they are aspiring students, briliiant minds of this country. and now their parents and friends mourn their untimely death.

[boynextdoors]

Mirpur DOHS, Bangladesh.

Photo by Taskin Meher.

[ayowotsdis]

THE STUDENTS OF BANGLADESH ARE DYING.

The so called students league called BCL or Bangladesh Chatro league, who are basically the rabid dogs of the rolling government of Bangladesh are attacking, assaulting and killing the students protesting against the Quota system that gives off government jobs for the children and grandchildren of freedom fighters of the liberation war. Our own prime minister called us rajakar (traitor who betrayed Bangladesh to Pakistan in 1971) and said anyone who isn't the child of declared freedom fighter is a child of a rajakar. So the students created a slogan "who am I? Who are you? Rajakar, rajakar!" Ignoring the irony of the slogan, the pm set her rabid dogs on the students, my people are dying because she (pm) refuses to let go of nepotism. We can't use our freedom of speech. Please help us.

Our Internet is being cut off, our accounts are being hacked, our electricity is said to be gone soon. SPREAD THE WORD.

[jupitereater]

I don’t know what to say. I feel like nothing I say will be enough. I want to scream, I want to cry, I want to walk up the street and bare my chest like Abu Sayed. My country is bleeding. My brothers and sisters are dead, or dying. They’re being picked up by plain clothes detectives during night time raids. They’re being tortured, they’re being disappeared.

The official death toll is 200+, the actual is 1000+. I don’t know if we’ll ever be able to list every death, after all, death registries are being stolen from hospitals by the pigs. I’ve seen too many people die this past week. By people, I mean children. I mean teenagers. I mean university students, high school students. Little kids under the age of 10, killed by gunshots from helicopters.

I don’t know what to say. All I can say is — আমার ভায়ের রক্ত বৃথা যেতে দেব না ।

They will pay. For every single drop of blood, they will pay, we will make them pay.

[altin-studies]

Bangladeshi female student having a seizure in shock of being beaten in University of Dhaka

It's been 240 hours. I keep watching as my country turns into those dystopian fantasies I love reading about. Except there's no happy ending, there's no epic good vs evil fight.

It's my government, my police, my law enforcement units beating and killing my fellow students without any remorse, any judgement.

I love my country. Without any kind of doubt. I have been taught patriotism since my childhood. But how can I love my people and motherland any further when all it wishes to do is to kill, kill, kill.

Police throwing tear shells in University of Dhaka from tanks

We live in a dystopia. Our law enforcement is here to kill brilliant students, students that want to make changes, students who speak up about their rights, students who build drones and robots. Our mainstream media wants the police to shoot at students so they can get exciting videos.

And they can get away with it. If social media is the only centre of our voice, then they'll block our internet. If the roads are where we protest, they'll order curfew.

Students attending funeral (without bodies) for the students killed by police shootings

My university wants nothing to do with us. They're above student protests, they're above having any ounce of responsibility for the death of so many of my brothers and sisters. "It's out of my control", our vice-chancellor says. And our chancellor? Well the president has had speech disorder for years now. He'll be back for convocation and cutting ribbons soon.

They'll end the curfews soon enough. They will tell us to go back to the campus they drove us out of with gunfire and tear shells. But how will we do so while we have a conscience? How can I step over the blood shed by my fellow students? How will I go back to classworks and labs and hangouts when there have been dead bodies in those streets merely weeks ago?

Injured dog (presumed dead by now) at the University of Dhaka campus

But it doesn't matter. This world does not care about genocides of millions of children in Palestine. Why would it care about 500 innocent students in such a small country like Bangladesh? My country, where equal chances at jobs and education needs a bloodier movement than establishing our language. Such a primitive land, isn't it?

The green is gone. It hasn't been here for such a long time. I'm sorry for being so hopeless and useless and helpless.

[the-stars-were-his]

i don't know if any of you know what's happening in bangladesh right now, but please educate yourselves. i don't know if my family there is even fucking alive.

the university students were protesting because the prime minister went back on her promise and reintroduced a quota that many view as unfair, because it allows students who have lower merit than others applying to beat out their fellow applicants, based on their heritage.

the prime minister insulted the protesters, then the protesters were protesting against her, then the police got involved and people were killed and injured. the government then shut down the internet and the country is in blackout.

over a hundred people have died by now, and even more are injured.

[ana-bananya]

Via cubangla on instagram

Cover art work by @/debashish.chakrabarty

[serein-koo7]

Celebration all across Bangladesh.😭🌸✊

[enigma-the-mysterious]

Bangladesh was BUILT on the blood and resistance of students. And Hasina really thought she could get away with what she did

[passing-through-bd]

STUDENT PROTESTS IN BANGLADESH

Injuries and casualties are rising!!! Thousands injured. Children dead.

Are you aware of the ongoing student protests in Bangladesh? All schools and universities have been shut down. Even the primary schools in cities. It has led to violence. There have been casualties. All because the students (18-25/26 year olds) wanted an equal foot in the job market.

https://www.cnn.com/2024/07/16/asia/bangladesh-protests-quote-intl-latam/index.html This is a CNN article on this topic. But casualties are rising. We need international support if we are to have any chance at a better future.

https://www.thedailystar.net/opinion/views/news/lecture-halls-the-streets-universities-submerged-dual-protests-3651751 Here is a local newspaper's coverage.

https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2024/07/bangladesh-witness-testimony-video-and-photographic-analysis-confirm-police-used-unlawful-force-against-protesters/ Amnesty International's article.

https://x.com/UNHumanRights/status/1813553026357162061 UN Human Rights also commented on this subject.

The network is being impacted.

#savebangladeshistudents

[nanobreaker]

Bangladesh Update

The Supreme Court was due to meet on the 7th of August to rule on the quota system. This was moved up to today (Sunday 21 July). The Supreme Court has now ruled that it will lift most of the quotas

Instead of 30% of government jobs being allocated to the relatives of freedom fighters, 5% of jobs will be reserved for them

**Apparently, the ruling includes a proviso that the government can reverse this decision if it so wishes (apologies but I don't have a source for this — I'm getting most of my info from relatives who are accessing Bengali media)

'Student leaders pledged to press on with demonstrations until key demands are met including the release of those jailed, and the resignation of officials responsible for the deadly crackdown' (Al Jazeera).

Personally, I don't think this is over yet; there is a huge appetite among the Bengali public for Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina to resign.

[boynextdoors]

[ayowotsdis]

If you cannot see your Bangladeshi moots online today it's because the government shut off the internet and call lines amidst the violence they are enacting upon their own student protests. I personally haven't been able to contact my family and friends back home for more than 10 hours.

[jupitereater]

[thatdeshigirl]

can you direct to resources that go into detail about the quota system and its flaws ? (from a non-bangladeshi)

THIS is the link to a Facebook post that goes into the details. The video gets informative around 45 seconds from the start, but I would recommend watching the entire video (5 minutes and 35 seconds) to understand the gravity of the situation.

This covers the situation pretty well, but if I am able to find anything more informative, I will also post that.

[thefirelookout]

Dead silence

This post is an attempt to share or let out some of my complex feelings about the situation in Bangladesh.

We went to our city's protest yesterday. It was a silent, peaceful protest. The Bangladeshi student community here in Kingston stood in a human chain with placards. "Save Bangladesh student", yes grammatically wrong, yes, it assumes that young revolutionaries need saving, so on and so forth. The protest started and ended quietly. My non-Bangladeshi friends were a bit confused, since they're used to chanty protests for Palestine, or union picket lines with cars passing by, honking in support. There was more noise even for the Iranian protests, Zan Zendegi Azadi. The silence of a graveyard in this one, though.

Who cares about little old Bangladesh? I sometimes wonder. We're not in the eye of the middle eastern storm like Syria, Lebanon or Palestine are. We're not strategically important, we don't even have many natural resources like Sudan or Congo do. The Prime Minister visited China recently to ask for an aid or a loan, and came back pretty much empty handed. China isn't very interested in us. India has gotten what it needed to get, and can milk more out of us, but they can do the same with Nepal or Bhutan too. We're never in the headlines, the US or the West in general isn't interested in us at all. And Pakistan denies that the 1971 genocide ever happened.

Which is why, the world isn't missing our voices due to the internet blackout.

The voices were all over my Facebook newsfeed. Aunties and apus on Facebook live selling sarees, jewelry, crafts, elderly boomers sharing gardening tips, quick fixes or herbal remedies that they swear by, people sharing posts about cricket or which cricketer's wife wore what, food bloggers calling every possible dish juicy (be it a burger or the meat in biriyani), celebrity drama, political drama to the extent of what was allowed back home. That sort of thing.

Now, again, there's the silence of a graveyard over here. And I feel like screaming till I snap my vocal cords. Can you all please come back? Please? The silence is unbearable! Please! I won't judge you if you sell your wares! Please! I won't judge if you think turmeric water can act as a miracle detox! Please, please I won't say a word if your post about your stupid cricket match! Just something, please say something! I haven't seen a single one of you online. Please don't die, please stay safe. When the internet comes back, please, post about your vacations and your pets. Not the dead, please, don't post about the bodies. I can take a bit of silence but not more bodies please!

Speaking of bodies. There was an armoured vehicle, painted navy blue in the colours of the police (fuck them). And there was a body on top of it. Dead, obviously, very dead, because it flopped down with the slightest nudge, and was left on the streets. Before that happened, the vehicle drove about as if parading its spoils of war, with the body on top. Sending a message. This will happen to you if you raise your voice.

That image has been haunting me for two nights now. So yeah, I'm not man enough to get some incisive political analysis out. I have no either or predictions for what happens if the regime falls or doesn't fall. My body feels numb, I've been binge eating because I still have food in the house and I won't be gunned down if I go out to get groceries now. My non-Bangladeshi friends, bless their first world hearts, have never had to live under fascism. Bless their hearts, have never had to stifle their voices to the extent that we've had to. Bless their beautiful hearts, could hardly pronounce Bangladesh. But they still showed up to that docile little protest because they care about my spouse and I. I can't even begin to thank them.

My insides are tearing up. I'm sitting with a poker face typing all this word vomit, but my insides are nothing but a scream. No clever realpolitik comes out of a heart that's screaming, because our mouths are sewn shut.