Sultana Akter, a returning officer at the Jahargirnagar University Central Students` Union (JUCSU) polls, has blamed the Election Commission’s mismanagement for the death of teacher Jannatul Ferdous.
She made the remarks while speaking to journalists outside the JUCSU Senate building on Friday afternoon as the vote counting process continued a day after the polls closed, reports bdnews24.com.
Jannatul Ferdous, an assistant professor at the fine arts department, died on Friday morning while on duty as a polling officer.
“It is due to the Election Commission’s mismanagement that my colleague Jannatul Ferdous died. I want a proper investigation of this incident. I demand compensation from the university authorities, who must take responsibility for this death,” Sultana said.
She added that teachers had been under immense pressure since Sept 10 to ensure smooth voting.
“I believe if I had been in her place, I too could have collapsed. We gave a hundred percent effort to make sure voting was fair. No one can claim even one percent manipulation,” she said.
Sultana explained that polling officials had been told in pre-election briefings that vote counting would be conducted electronically at the Senate Building.
“But after Sep 10, we suddenly learned that the votes would be counted manually,” she said.
She argued that manual counting at each hall would have finished by 10pm, with results declared by 11pm.
“In that case, we would not have had to witness my colleague’s death,” she said.
She described how Jannatul Ferdous, already exhausted and under pressure, fell ill and collapsed while reporting for duty on Friday morning, dying before reaching hospital.
“If results had been declared the previous night, this would not have happened,” she added, demanding a change to the current counting system.
Nearly 24 hours after JUCSU polls closed, vote counting for the hall unions have still not been completed.
According to the Election Commission, counting in two halls is still pending.
