Committed to providing all assistance to our students: MEA spokesperson on Bangladesh protests

Randhir Jaiswal, the official spokesperson of the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) has spoken about assisting and safeguarding Indian nationals and students in Dhaka, Bangladesh via a video on social media platform X, formerly Twitter. To contextualise, this video is associated with the ongoing protests in Bangladesh.

"As you all are aware of the protest which is happening there, we have around 8,500 students and somewhere, around 15,000 Indian nationals resident in the country. We have issued a travel advisory for people to be in touch with the high commission," said Jaiswal in the video.

In addition to this, the high commission has also provided emergency contact numbers for Indian students residing in Bangladesh.

The emergency contact numbers are:

High Commission of India, Dhaka +880-1937400591 (also on WhatsApp)

Assistant High Commission of India, Chittagong +880-1814654797/+880-1814654799 (also on WhatsApp)

Assistant High Commission of India, Rajshahi +880-1788148696 (also on WhatsApp)

Assistant High Commission of India, Sylhet +880-1313076411 (also on WhatsApp)

Assistant High Commission of India, Khulna +880-1812817799 (also on WhatsApp)

Furthermore, the spokesperson also urged the Indian nationals residing in Bangladesh to stay in touch. "The high commission will be giving regular updates on the situation there. We urge all family members of Indian nationals who reside in Bangladesh to stay in touch," added Jaiswal in the video.

In conclusion, he said, "We remain committed to providing all possible assistance to our students."

Bangladesh is witnessing protests over the quota system that reserves a significant number of Civil Service posts for certain groups. This includes children of those who took part in the country’s 1971 war of independence against Pakistan, as reported by ANI.

Moreover, as per reports, more than 100 students have been injured and the demonstrations have turned violent.