Dhaka, Bangladesh:

Bangladeshi students battled police for control of the streets and won, but if their country is to embark on a new journey, someone has to clear the road ahead.

Gridlock is a fact of life in the capital Dhaka, a megacity of 20 million which relies on a corps of police wardens to clear long snarls of cars and pedal rickshaws through intersections.

With officers on strike after the resignation of ex-premier Sheikh Hasina, the students who forced her ouster have stepped up to do the job themselves.

“Our country can’t remain in a standstill,” Nasrin Akter Koly, 21, told AFP.

“We clashed with the police, that’s why the police are not on duty,” she added. “So instead of the police, our people must do the work.”

Traffic control is a humdrum job at the best of times and many of Dhaka’s usual wardens are known for a casual indifference to aggressive drivers zooming by out of turn.

But Koly and her classmates have brought a new enthusiasm to the vocation as they wave through cars at one of the downtown business district’s busiest crossroads.

Drivers are in turn treating the volunteers with respect.

Nearly all are stopping on command and heeding polite but firm directions to fasten their seatbelts — the kind of minor traffic infraction that would have previously been ignored.

“After a revolution, every country faces some difficulties,” said Nahid Kalam Nabil, 22, while directing traffic alongside Koly.

“The students are handling the situation now, and they will keep the country safe,” he added.

‘Teaching the people’

More than 450 people were killed during weeks of clashes between protesters and security forces before Hasina quit and fled to India on Monday.

Protests had been largely peaceful until police attempted to violently disperse them, setting in motion the chain of events that led to the end of Hasina’s iron-fisted 15-year tenure.

Dozens of police officers were killed in the unrest, according to police and hospital figures given to AFP.

After her departure, vandalism and arson attacks hit roughly 450 of the country’s 600 police stations, according to the force.

Police unions declared a national strike on Tuesday “until the security” of officers was assured, and a new police chief apologised for the conduct of officers under his sacked predecessor.

Unrest has since subsided, thanks in part to students volunteering for neighbourhood watch patrols and guarding houses of worship for minority religions, which were subjected to isolated looting attacks.

“They are safeguarding the houses at night, they are safeguarding the mosques, temples and churches,” Nabil said.

“They are teaching the people law and order. They are designing the country in a new way.”

Many police officers began returning to work Friday with soldiers — held in high esteem for not intervening on Hasina’s side during the unrest — standing guard.

Farida Akhter, a member of the interim government tasked with steering democratic reforms, told AFP that restoring law and order was the “first priority” of the new dispensation.

The sudden collapse of Hasina’s administration left a gaping vacuum in political administration, with many civil servants staying home waiting for the dust to settle.

The city government in Dhaka has also laid low, prompting other student volunteers to take on its duties.

“With this students’ protest, we have made a fascist regime fall,” 20-year-old Samanjar Chowdhury Mrittika told AFP while wielding a broom to sweep up garbage from a downtown sidewalk.

“The country is not in a good condition,” she added. “Someone must take responsibility.”

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Dhaka:

More than 100 students were injured across Bangladesh on Monday in clashes between those protesting to end a quota system for government jobs and others loyal to the ruling party, police and witnesses said.

The protests mark the first significant demonstrations that Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has faced since she won a fourth straight term in an election in January boycotted by the main opposition.

Thousands of anti-quota protesters and members of the student wing of Hasina’s Awami League hurled rocks and fought each other with sticks and iron rods at universities across the country, including Dhaka, police and witnesses said.

Students were injured on several campuses, police officials said.

The protesters called for marches and rallies to continue across the country to press their demands.

“This is more than just a student movement. To suppress this movement, incitement from the highest levels of government has been made. So, common people have to come to the streets,” said Nahid Islam, the coordinator of the anti-quota protests.

The protests began earlier this month after the High Court ordered the government to restore 30% job quotas for the descendants of freedom fighters. They have continued despite Bangladesh’s top court suspending that order for a month last week.

The protests intensified on Sunday night after Hasina refused to meet the students’ demands, stating that the issue was now before the court.

Hasina said those who oppose job quotas for relatives of freedom fighters are the ‘Razakar’, which collaborated with the Pakistani army during the 1971 War of Independence. Her comments led thousands of students to leave their dormitories on the Dhaka University campus at midnight to protest.

“An attempt is being made to transform the anti-quota movement into an anti-state one using the emotions of young students,” said Foreign Minister Hasan Mahmud. “The government will not allow an unstable situation to develop.”

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)