The last time Oshmita Tanisha spoke to her father back in Bangladesh, she didn’t have much to say.
“I just told him, ‘Don’t go outside, don’t let my brother go to school, and stay safe,'” she recounted to CBC.
The international student is one of many Bangladeshis in Ottawa who fear for the safety of family members back home, after more than 100 people were killed in violent protests last week.
A nationwide internet blackout imposed by the government on Thursday has made communication challenging.
“The cellular network is on … but calls are too choppy,” explained Ottawa resident Mohammad Salah Uddin. “They can receive the call, we can hear they’re trying to speak, but we can’t understand what they’re saying.”
The last time Salah Uddin heard from his parents and three brothers, they were barricading themselves in their houses in the capital, Dhaka, after the nation was put under curfew on Friday night.
On Saturday, the streets of the capital city were empty, as military forces patrolled the area.
“If they go outside there is no guarantee that they will return home,” Salah Uddin said.
Bangladesh’s government has called in the military to end days of violent protest in the capital of Dhaka. Demonstrators are furious over a government policy that earmarks up to 30 per cent of civil service jobs for the descendants of veterans of the 1971 war of independence against Pakistan.
Protests escalating to ‘point of no return’
What began as a student movement centred upon fair access to civil service jobs in the midst of a government quota system has become something much bigger, according to Salah Uddin.
The frustration stems from high unemployment rates and economic woes, he said, adding that the rapid death toll has only heightened citizens’ anger.
“I think it has gone into a point of no return,” he said.
Mehnaz Tabassum agrees.
“A reformation for the government, I think that’s what people in Bangladesh are seeking,” said Tabassum, an Ottawa public servant who visited her parents and extended family in the spring.
She said she was surprised by the high cost of living and lack of employment opportunities.
“I moved to Canada when I was 17 … and [when I left I was feeling] the same level of anger and anguish that these kids are feeling. Why are there no opportunities? Why can’t we live a better life?”
Tabassum said she’s also had trouble getting in touch with her family.
In the one- or two-minute phone calls she’s been able to have with them, they’ve told her they’re “scared but surviving.”
Students in Canada protest in solidarity
Tanisha, who was in Bangladesh just a month ago, said she feels a tremendous amount of guilt over not being there now.
The last she heard, many of her friends were injured in the protests.
“There was tear gas. They got shot at,” she said. “It’s not fair that I get to be safe and sound … while they’re fighting for their life.”
To show solidarity from afar, Tanisha attended a protest Friday outside the Bangladesh High Commission.
Today, she’ll be at another one on Parliament Hill — one she helped organize as a member of the University of Ottawa Bangladeshi Students Association.
“The world has to know what’s happening back home,” she said.
