Photos: Curfew mostly empties Dhaka’s streets following days of violence

BenarNews staff
2024.07.22
Dhaka
Photos: Curfew mostly empties Dhaka’s streets following days of violence Soldiers guard an intersection in Segunbagicha area in Dhaka while a few commuters travel during a two-hour break in curfew, July 22, 2024.
BenarNews

The streets of Dhaka bore a deserted look Monday and through the weekend, except for security forces who patrolled after the Bangladesh government imposed a nationwide curfew last week following deadly street clashes.

The order restricts people to their homes for all but two hours each day when they are allowed to go out. During that break, people could be seen lining up at grocery and other stores, or to pay bills. 

Police and security force members were out in large numbers on the streets as well as surveying the situation from the air. 

After days of violent clashes that claimed the lives of at least 138 people, the nation’s Supreme Court slashed a quota system that initially began the student agitation.

On Sunday, the court determined 93% of civil service jobs be awarded based on merit, 5% be allocated to relatives of those who fought in Bangladesh’s war of independence in 197, 1% to minority ethnic groups and 1% to individuals with disabilities and transgender people.

Previously 56% of government jobs were set aside under the quota system, including 30% for relatives of veterans of the 1971 war, and 10% for women.

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Bangladesh Army chief Gen. Waker-Uz-Zaman (front, third from left) inspects the Chattogram highway in Dhaka during the curfew, July 22, 2024. [BenarNews]
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From a helicopter, Inspector General of Police Chowdhury Abdullah Al-Mamun monitors the Chattogram highway in Dhaka during the curfew, July 22, 2024. [BenarNews]
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Bangladeshis line up at a gas office to pay bills during a two-hour break in curfew in the Kawran Bazar area of Dhaka, July 22, 2024. [BenarNews]
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Sanjida Akter (right) waits in front of the mortuary of the Dhaka Medical College and Hospital to receive the body of her brother who was killed during a clash in Dhaka three days earlier, July 22, 2024. [BenarNews]
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A fire burns as a military vehicle approaches a road block set up by protesters in the Rampura area of Dhaka, July 20, 2024. [BenarNews]
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Soldiers walk on a street in the Rampura area of Dhaka on the first full day of a nationwide curfew, July 20, 2024. [BenarNews]
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Military personnel take position around an armored vehicle in the Rampura area of Dhaka, July 20, 2024. [BenarNews]
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Vehicles burned in fires three days earlier remain on the street near the Disaster Management Directorate office in Dhaka, July 21, 2024. [BenarNews]
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