Students of NSTU have brought 16 complaints including sexually harassing female students against an Assistant Professor of Noakhali Science and Technology University (NSTU), SM Mushfiqur Rahman Ashiq of Education Department. Complaints include asking indecent questions to girl students during the viva of online exams; forcing students to sit in their office till 8:30 pm for no specific reason; giving unethical hints to students to increase marks; giving privileges to preferred students during exams; directly directing students in exam halls and classrooms and threatening the students are the main allegations.
It also says that there is a huge difference in the results of those who ‘obey’ SM Mushfiqur Rahman Ashiq and those who do not. He engage the other student of his choice of the same batch to record the results in the result sheets.
Apart from this, he has been accused of insulting the chairman and other teachers, giving more marks to preferred students through biased behavior, psychologically torturing students by dragging out personal issues.
On Sunday (August 14, 2022), 18 students of the fourth year of the 2017-2018 academic year of the department submitted a written complaint to Dr. Newaz Mohammad Bahadur, Dean of the Faculty of Education.
Mentioning that many students have been harassed by him for giving presentation or viva in burqa, the students said that SM Mushfiqur Rahman Ashiq distributes the marks as per his wish due to the availability of multiple courses in one semester. He evaluates the answer sheets during the examination and comments adversely on the results of the students.
On the other hand, the students complained of giving choice papers to the students on the night before the exam and influencing the ‘Teacher Evaluation Programme’ conducted by IQAC of the university.
In the complaint, a student who was the victim of the first batch of the department said, ‘More or less all the girls in our department are victims of his harassment. We want a fair trial. It is by no means desirable that any female student of the university should be harassed by a teacher.’
Another victim student said, ‘The complaints of mark tampering and giving immoral hints to girl students is quiet old. But it has now gone beyond tolerable levels. We have informed the matter in writing to the Chairman and Dean of the department. SM Mushfiqur Rahman Ashiq should be exempted from the activities of the department.’
Acknowledging receiving the complaint letter, the Dean of the Faculty of Education, Professor Dr. Newaz Mohammad Bahadur said, ‘We have received a complaint in this regard. The matter is very sensitive. We will sit with the Vice-Chancellor and verify the complaints by forming an inquiry committee. If the complaint is proved, action will be taken according to the law of the university.’
However, accused teacher SM Mushfiqur Rahman Ashiq has claimed that the allegations are ‘motivated and fabricated’.
Biplab Mallik, chairman of the education department, said that a committee will be formed to investigate the matter. Therefore, he does not want to comment on this before the formation and investigation of the committee.