HUNDREDS of students protested today near where a Bangladeshi air force training jet crashed into a school in the capital Dhaka, demanding accountability, compensation for the victims’ families and an end to training flights.

The death toll from the crash rose to 31, including at least 25 students, a teacher who died from burns she sustained while helping others escape the burning building and the pilot of the aircraft.

Firefighters further secured the site in Dhaka’s densely populated Uttara neighbourhood, while the military launched an investigation. The civil aviation authority was not directly involved in the investigation.

Bangladesh declared a day of national mourning, with flags flying at half-mast across the country.

The protesting students demanded “accurate” publication of the identities of the dead and injured, compensation for their families and an immediate halt to the use of “outdated and unsafe” training aircraft by the Bangladesh air force.

They accused security officials of beating them and manhandling teachers at the crash site on Monday.

The students became furious after two senior government advisers arrived at the scene, forcing them to take cover.

Elsewhere in Dhaka, hundreds of other students marched toward Bangladesh’s administrative headquarters, demanding the resignation of the education adviser who, they said, had delayed announcing that public exams were being cancelled during the day of mourning.

Monday’s crash at the Milestone School and College caused a fire that gutted the two-storey building. Officials said 171 people, mostly students and many with burns, had been rescued and carried away in helicopters, ambulances, motorised rickshaws and in the arms of firefighters and parents.