Why Deadly Protests Are Roiling Bangladesh

Tens of thousands of Bangladeshi citizens took to the streets on Thursday, joining university students demanding an overhaul of how government jobs are distributed.

The protests have turned increasingly violent in recent days, resulting in a groundswell of anger against Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina after she deployed the police and paramilitary forces to tame protesters. As of Thursday, at least 17 people, mostly students, had been killed and hundreds of others injured. Large areas of Dhaka, the capital, remained empty, and the city shut down its only metro rail service.

The students have been agitating for weeks about a quota system for government jobs that benefit certain groups, including the families of those who fought for independence from Pakistan.

Anisul Huq, the law minister, said on Thursday that the government favored overhauling the quota system and would work with student leaders to find a resolution, but added that the Supreme Court would make the final decision.

The protesters, who have begun counterattacks on the police, said they would not negotiate with the government. On Thursday, they targeted the national television station headquarters, setting fire to it.

Here’s what to know about why the quota system has become such a point of contention.

What has happened so far in Bangladesh?

Students at the University of Dhaka, the country’s top institution, started the demonstrations on July 1, and they later spread to other elite universities. The protests turned violent when members of the pro-quota student wing of the governing party, the Awami League, began attacking the protesters, said Zahed Ur Rahman, a political analyst. Mr. Rahman said the group’s assault on female students further inflamed the situation.

Besides sending the police and paramilitaries into the streets, including an antiterrorism unit, the government has locked down schools and colleges. Officials said they had slowed down internet connectivity to stop the spread of rumors and protect citizens, making it harder for protesters to organize and make plans via social media platforms. The police have used rubber bullets, sound grenades and tear gas to disperse crowds. But the protests continue.

Why are the students protesting?

The protests are about coveted government jobs and who is entitled to them. An old quota system, reinstated recently by the Supreme Court, reserves more than half of those jobs for various groups. The students say that the system is unfair and that most of the positions should be filled based on merit. They consider it an urgent demand in a country where the pace of job creation, according to a World Bank report, has slowed in recent years. Bangladesh is one of the world’s least developed countries, according to a United Nations trade body.

The paucity of jobs has disproportionately affected workers ages 15 to 29, even as more graduate from college, the report found. That makes public-sector jobs — seen as stable and brimming with benefits — more desirable.

Why were quotas put in place?

The quota system was introduced in 1972 by Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, who led his country’s fight for independence from Pakistan in 1971. Thousands of protesters and fighters were killed in that war.

The quota system ensured that the state would take care of the descendants of those considered freedom fighters. Today, a total of 56 percent of government jobs are reserved, a majority of which are for the kin of those fighters. Smaller quotas were later introduced for women, minorities and those with disabilities. Protesting students are also calling for the quotas for women and people from certain districts of Bangladesh to be removed, but they are in favor of reserving jobs for disabled people and minorities.

Wasn’t the quota system abolished once?

Yes. In 2018, two students from the University of Dhaka and a journalist petitioned a Dhaka high court, asking for the quota system to be overhauled. Student protests accompanied the appeal, although they were not as violent as this time. After months of demonstrations, Ms. Hasina, then prime minister, abolished the system. But in June, the Supreme Court reinstated the quotas after some families of freedom fighters filed a suit.

“Under her rule, the judiciary is completely under her control,” said Asif Nazrul, a professor of law at the University of Dhaka who works with student protesters.

The situation has become politicized.

Pro-quota groups are supporters of Ms. Hasina, who won her fourth straight election in January. The student wing of her party also supports the quotas. After some of them attacked the protesters this month, the Bangladesh Nationalist Party, the main opposition to Ms. Hasina’s party, began calling for more protesters to get involved.

On Wednesday, Ms. Hasina addressed the nation and said that the government would create a judicial committee to investigate the deaths — there were six then — and that students would get justice. It remains unclear who caused their deaths. Her statements were a change from a few days ago, when she questioned whether the reserved jobs should be allocated to “razakar” — a derogatory term used to describe those who sided with the Pakistanis in 1971. Many took that comment as a veiled reference to the students demanding quota changes.

“The prime minister’s comments, where she seemingly compared the protesting students to ‘razakars,’ fueled the protests,” Mr. Rahman, the political analyst, said.

On July 10, the Supreme Court paused the reinstatement of the quotas for four weeks because of the protests.