Education minister Dipu Moni on Thursday termed reasonable the movement by the agitating students of the Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology and assured that their 16-point demands would be met within a shortest possible time.
She said that all the demands of the students were reasonable and the vice-chancellor of the university could have resolved the crisis by discussing with the students but there was a communication gap between the two sides and hoped that such kind of crisis would not take place in future.
Dipu Moni made the remarks while talking to journalists after emerging from a four-hour meeting with a delegation of the demonstrating students.
BUET VC Saiful Islam, deputy minister for education Mohibul Hasan Chowdhury Nowfel, Bangladesh Chhatra League central president Rezwanul Haque Chowdhury Shovon and general secretary Golam Rabbani also attended the meeting.
One of the organisers of the movement, Anisur Rahman Mithu, said that the education minister assured them that the demands would be met but the university authorities should issue a notice regarding this assurance within today (Friday).
He also threatened that if the university authorities failed to meet their demands they would continue their movement.
Earlier, the agitating students staged demonstrations for five consecutive days boycotting all academic activities to press home their 16-point demands.
The 16-point demands include: forming a special committee comprising teachers of civil engineering and architecture departments to build the BUET gate; infrastructure development in the residential halls; organising a competition for the students interested to design the gate; removing the ‘controversial’ director of Student’s Welfare and appointing someone else to the post.
Other important demands are: introducing a teacher evaluation system; naming the female dormitory after Sabekun Nahar Sony; re-introducing the system of giving double supplementary to students who acquire 108 credit; completing the infrastructure development projects which were halted; digitising the payment process for the students; increasing the allocation for research; and introducing the code system instead of roll numbers in the exams.
Source: Newage
