STUDENTS of Jagannath University have held protests the illegal occupation of their residential hall by an influential political leader for more than three decades now. They have yet again taken to the streets, when land grabbing and other wrongdoings of the ruling party lawmaker for the Dhaka 7 constituency came to light after the arrest of his son, a councillor for Dhaka’s south ward 30, now suspended, on October 25. Students under the banner of the Bangladesh General Students’ Rights Council held a rally on Saturday, demanding the reclamation of their residential, Tibet Hall, from the clutches of the lawmaker, who built a multi-storey market on the land that he grabbed in 1985. The law maker, as the students allege, attacked students of 12 halls of the erstwhile Jagannath College and evicted the students. Students have since then demanded that the authorities should reclaim the hall and resolve the their accommodation crisis. There have been class boycott, cancellation of examinations, cases and counter-cases, but the Tibet Hall remained illegally occupied.

Founded in 1858 and renamed as Jagannath School in 1872, the 158-year-old institution was approved as a fully-fledged public university in 2005 and remains as the only public university in the country with no residential halls. About 20,000 students now study in the university and most of the students live in hostels and messes spending on an average Tk 5,000–6,000 a month. There are no quarters for some 600 teachers and about 500 officials and employees either. The students have, therefore, repeatedly urged the university administration to reclaim the land and arrange for the accommodation of students. The government and the university administration have turned a blind eye. The student demonstrations were, meanwhile, attacked by the people of the lawmaker in 2014. Students allege that the lawmaker has abused his power in occupying government and privately owned land. Local people level similar allegations against him that he illegally evicted many rightful owners from their land in Old Town of Dhaka. Media report that the lawmaker illegally demolished one of the oldest commercial buildings in Dhaka, encroached on about 2.5 acres of the old Buriganga channel at Kamrangirchar and Jhauchar.

The university administration must take the issue of accommodation crisis seriously considering that private accommodation is an added burden on students. It is welcome that the university registrar, after decades of indifference, has finally agreed to take up the issue with the authorities concerned. The ruling quarters can in no way justify such an abuse of power and must, therefore, take immediate action to reclaim the Tibet Hall. In what follows, it should also judiciously investigate all other allegations of land grabbing by the lawmaker at hand.