DOZENS were injured in Savar, near Dhaka, today as police fired tear gas and rubber bullets and set about protesting crowds with truncheons.

The officers charged into clashes between a pro-government student body and other student protesters at Jahangir Naga University outside the Bangladeshi capital.

Protests are demanding an end to a quota system for Civil Service jobs that reserves 30 per cent for relatives of veterans of the 1971 war of independence against Pakistan.

Each year 3,000 graduate-level Civil Service vacancies open up, available to about 400,000 graduates, but protesters say the quota is archaic and discriminatory, and appointments should be based on merit alone.

Some argue that in practice, the quotas reserve key roles in the supposedly neutral Civil Service for supporters of the governing Awami League party of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.

Demonstrators against the quotas say they were engaged in peaceful rallies when assaulted by the Bangladesh Chhatra League, the Awami League’s youth wing. They allege that police then joined the youth league members in the attack.

Police official Abdullahil Kafi denied this, saying that protesters had attacked officers first and that 15 police were injured. 

More than 50 people were treated at Enam Medical College Hospital near Jahangir Nagar University as the violence continued for hours, said Ali Bin Solaiman, a medical officer of the hospital. He said at least 30 of them suffered pellet wounds.

The latest clashes follow violence at Dhaka University on Monday. Bangladesh’s High Court nullified a 2018 ruling against the quota system last month, triggering the protests. The Supreme Court is due to rule on the question again next month.