A probe panel has found video footage from a CCTV camera that proves that Rabindra University teacher Farhana Yeasmin Baten forcibly cut the hair of several students, reports bdnews24.com.
A group of students have been staging a hunger strike for a second day on Thursday, demanding the permanent removal of Farhana, the chairman of the university's Cultural Heritage and Bangladesh Studies Department.
Farhana also held two other positions: an assistant proctor and a member of the university board. She stepped down from all positions.
The protesters claimed that the teacher had previously scolded a group of male students for keeping their hair long.
She was seen standing with a pair of scissors in front of an exam hall where first-year students sat for their final test on Sept 26. She then stopped students whose hair exceeded a certain length. Later, she chopped off the hair of 16 students at the entrance.
One of the victims tried to commit suicide by taking sleeping pills a day after the incident because of the humiliation. He was admitted to Khwaja Yunus Ali Medical College in Enayetpur, said Laila Ferdous Himel of the Rabindra Studies Department.
The university authority formed a panel on Tuesday to investigate the incident. She denied that she had forcibly cut the hair of 16 students.
“A CCTV camera was available at the scene and we received the video footage from it. It proves the incident of (the teacher) cutting off the hair of some students with scissors,” said Laila.
“The probe panel held several meetings and there’ll be one today as well. We hope to submit a report by tomorrow,” she said. The report and the video footage will be shared with the media as they want to be transparent, she said.
Though Farhana already stepped down from three positions, the protesters have vowed to press ahead with their calls for her resignation from the university. The protesters have blocked the administration building and other buildings. Exams have been postponed due to the demonstration.
“We want a campus free of Farhana Yeasmin Baten. That’s why we locked down the buildings. We’ll continue to protest until she is removed,” said Noman Siddique Shanto, a first-year student in the Cultural Heritage and Bangladesh Studies Department.
Habibur Rahman Habib and Majedul Islam, two of the 14 students taking part in the hunger strike, fell ill and returned to the protest after receiving treatment.
“Nothing like this happened,” Farhana said in her denial of the incident, claiming she had not touched a hair on the students’ heads. “I was surprised to see it in the newspapers.”
The teacher said there should have been photos or videos of the alleged incident, and the students would not have taken the exam the next day had the incident actually happened. “If I wanted to cut the hair of 16 students and none of them protested at that time?”
“I haven’t cut the hair of a single student,” she said.
Farhana said she believed some ‘internal politics’ may have stirred the outcry.
“There was an issue in the university in 2019. At the time I had filed a writ against the students on behalf of the teachers. Now those students are leading the protest against me,” she said.
After doing her master’s in anthropology at Dhaka University, Farhana had worked as a teacher of a private university for some time. She joined the public university in Sirajganj in 2018.