Dhaka University (DU) Sociology Professor Dr Samina Luthfa staged a five-minute silent protest in class on Sunday, covering her mouth with a black cloth, to protest the “harassment of teachers” for expressing their views and show solidarity with colleagues facing pressure “over academic freedom”.

“I staged a personal protest,” she wrote in a Facebook post on Sunday, urging others to “reclaim the classrooms” to show solidarity.

“Today, I went to class and worked with my students to establish a classroom code of conduct. We discussed what students can and cannot do without permission, as well as how disagreements should be resolved,” she added.

Luthfa’s protest came after a decision to bar Dr Tasneem Siraj Mahboob, an associate professor in DU’s English Department, from taking classes following allegations that she called a student wearing a niqab a “fundamentalist” and a “terrorist” during a class on October 7.

Luthfa did not specify the incident she was protesting against in her Facebook post.

According to the allegations, Tasneem made the remarks during a class for master’s final-semester students on October 7.

Following the allegations, an emergency meeting of the department’s academic committee on October 8 decided to bar her from taking classes of the batch. Her ongoing course was also reassigned to other teachers.

In a subsequent Facebook Live session, Tasneem claimed she had not been given an opportunity to defend herself before the decision was made. She also alleged that the department had not sought an explanation from her.

However, a leaked audio recording of the October 7 exchange appears to capture Tasneem asking a classmate of the niqab-wearing student: “Who can vouch she’s not a fundamentalist and terrorist?”