University of Rajshahi officers and employees have demanded a safe and secure work environment on the campus. They held a human chain along the Paris Road on the campus on January 14 and sat in near the administrative building and abstained from work for three hours in the morning on January 15 to push for their demands. The situation arose from two recent incidents in which groups of local people captured two officials of two university halls from near the campus and handed them over to the Motihar police, who arrested them in cases filed on charges of attacking the student-led procession on August 5, 2024. The official of the Shah Makhdum Hall, captured from Binodpur Bazar, is a leader of Ward 30 of the city unit of the Awami League and the official of the Sher-e-Bangla Hall, captured from Meherchandi, is an organising secretary of the Paba unit of the Awami League. The Rajshahi University Officers’ Association says that the incidents harm the administrative and academic activities as officers were humiliated, harassed and intimidated during working time on the campus and before and after work hours on their way to and from their offices.
The officers’ association says that if there were allegations against anyone, the university administration has set rules to follow in dealing with such matters and the police have laws to adhere to. But, anyone entering the campus from outside, harassing officials and employees and dragging them out before their handover to the police is unacceptable. The association notes that mobbing, mental harassment and physical assault on university officers have increased in recent times, demanding that the individuals and quarters engaged in such acts should be held to account. The association says that it has repeatedly demanded a secure campus environment but the university administration has failed to take any effective measures in this direction. It appears that mobbing of such kinds has resulted from what happened at the university on December 22, 2025. The university authorities on the day relieved six deans, alleged to have been leaning towards the Awami League which fell on August 5, 2024 amidst a mass uprising, of their responsibilities amidst protests by students led by the Rajshahi University Central Students’ Union, overwhelmingly dominated by the Islami Chhatra Shibir, the student wing of the Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami. The event at hand appears to be an extension of the deans’ removal episode, only having involved outsiders in the absence of resolute action by either the university or the government.
The universities and the government should, therefore, wake up to the reality and stringently deal with such episodes based on rules and legislation and keep mobs off. It is time both the authorities acted.
