STUDENTS’ STRIKE

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29931, 19 September 1962, Page 22

STUDENTS’ STRIKE

Dacca Police Use Guns

(N.ZP A.-Reuter—Copyright) KARACHI, Sept. 17.

Forty persons were injured when police fired on a stu-dent-led crowd of demonstrators in Dacca, East Pakistan, after tear-gas and baton charges failed to disperse them, it was reported in Karachi today. The authorities called in the Army to take control of part of the city, the reports said. The students were demanding lower fees and changes in recently introduced educational reforms. The demonstrators were reported to have forced a general strike in Dacca and Chittagong, another East Pakistan city. The Dacca firing took place after students had stoned police. Some policemen were reported to be among the injured.

Students’ strikes were reported in five other East Pakistan towns and in some cases businesses were compelled to close, cars were burned and buses forced off the road.

Students in Karachi also struck, and expressed support at a meeting for their East Pakistan colleagues. Their main demand is the reintroduction of a two-year degree course, which was replaced by a three-year course on the recommendation of an education commission appointed by the former military regime. The Central Education Minister (Mr Quader Chawdhury) said in Lahore that the Government would not make any fundamental changes in the education system, but was prepared to consider genuine demands of the students.