Criticising the education minister, National Citizen Party (NCP) Chief Organiser (South) and Cumilla-4 MP Hasnat Abdullah today said the minister owed his position to the students who took to the streets during the July Uprising.
“You call them [students] ‘farm chickens’. It is these so-called ‘farm chickens’ who took to the streets and made you the education minister,” he said.
Hasnat made the remarks while speaking as the chief guest at an NCP rally held in Sonargaon of Narayanganj.
He also accused the education minister of forcing HSC examinees to sit for their exams despite having to wade through knee-deep — and in some places chest-deep — floodwater to reach the centres.
“You included two flawed creative questions in the exam. Imagine the mental stress the students had to endure,” he said, addressing the minister.
Saying students were not guinea pigs, the NCP leader urged the government to stop experimenting with the education system.
“You repeatedly impose new systems on students, only to withdraw them when they fail. You do this because your own children study abroad. You cannot continue experimenting on other people’s children. This will no longer be tolerated in Bangladesh,” he said.
He also criticised the home minister’s remarks in parliament regarding the constitutional reform committee.
“The home minister yesterday told parliament that there is no provision for a constitutional reform committee in the constitution. If that is the case, then the 2026 election was not in the constitution either. Going by the constitution, the election was supposed to be held in 2029,” he said.
“You were supposed to be in Shillong, the prime minister in London, and party activists in paddy fields or driving rickshaws in Dhaka. Students and people took to the streets against this constitution. Unfortunately, you [BNP govt] have shown contempt for students and people and taken a position against them,” he added.
Among others, NCP Joint Member Secretary and Narayanganj-4 MP Abdullah Al Amin, district convener Zubair Sardar and city convener Shawkat Ali also spoke at the rally.
