Dhaka: The ongoing student protests in Bangladesh took an unprecedented turn on Friday as demonstrators stormed a jail in the central district of Narsingdi and freed hundreds of inmates before setting the prison on fire.
“The inmates fled the jail and protesters set the jail on fire,” AFP quoted a police officer as saying. He estimated the number of escaped inmates to be in ‘hundreds’.
According to local resident Ripon, he saw at least 20 men leaving the jail with their belongings.
The protests, initially sparked by anger over government job quotas, snowballed into a much bigger movement against Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s government.
At least 50 deaths have been reported this week as the government looks to get a grip on the violent protests which have spread like wildfire.
The jail fire incident apart, there were fresh clashes in other parts of the country on Friday resulting in 3 people losing their lives.
Government authorities disrupted telecommunications, snapping mobile and Internet services to curb the unrest.
Exiled acting chairman of main opposition party Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) Tarique Rahman urged the public to back the students and their ‘movement’.
“I call upon all leaders, activists, and common people … to stand by these tender-hearted students, provide them with all support, and carry this movement forward,” Tarique wrote on X.
Many observers fear that the ongoing unrest may have opened old and sensitive political faultlines between freedom fighters who toiled for Bangladesh’s independence from Pakistan in 1971 and those accused of collaborating with Islamabad.
