A section of students from Jahangirnagar University (JU) blocked the Dhaka-Aricha highway for about ten minutes till 12.08pm Monday demanding restoration of the merit-based recruitment policy for first and second class government jobs.

The blockade caused severe traffic jam on the highway.

Before wrapping up their demonstration, the students threatened that unless their demand is met they would block the crucial highway adjacent to the university campus for an indefinite period from 4 July, when the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court is set to hold a hearing on the matter.

In October 2018, under the pressure of mass student movement, the government introduced the policy replacing the older quota-based system, but in June this year the High Court reinstated the quotas for the children of freedom fighters in first and second class government job recruitment.

The government has challenged the High Court order and the full bench of the Appellate Division is expected to rule on the matter next month.

 JU students started their Monday protest with a rally at the university’s Shaheed Minar area. Later, they brought out a procession through different roads on the campus. The procession culminated in a symbolic blockade of Dhaka-Aricha highway at around 11.45am.

The students placed a four-point demand before the government: cancellation of quota facilities for freedom fighters and others in all government job recruitment and keeping some reserved positions only for the backward communities, limiting the quota facility to one time for a single candidate from an underprivileged community, appointing merited individuals to reserved posts when the posts stay vacant due to absence of eligible candidate, and taking steps for ensuring corruption free and merit-based bureaucracy.

The protesting students said the constitution clearly states that government jobs can be reserved only for backward communities and does not specifically refer to offspring of freedom fighters, refuting what the High Court tried to say in its 5 June order.

They said the quota system brings back the same undue disparity among worthy and less meritorious candidates that the oppressive Pakistan regime maintained in the country before the 1971 war of liberation.

Millions of freedom fighters joined the war to end the discrimination, but now perpetuating the same discrimination under their name is an insult to their memory.