Yasin Arafat, a 2023-24 academic-year student in the Bangla department at Barishal University, died while receiving treatment at Dhaka Medical on Sunday night, 9 August, after a road crash. News of his death spread across the university around 10:30pm, prompting grieving and angry students to begin protests.

Students blocked the Barishal-Patuakhali highway indefinitely, described in the report also as the Dhaka-Kuakata highway. They locked the university’s administrative office and confined the vice-chancellor’s office. Arafat had been seriously injured at about 3:30pm on Sunday when a Mahendra vehicle and a bus collided head-on on the Dapdapia Bridge in Barishal.

He was initially treated at Sher-e-Bangla Medical before being transferred to Dhaka Medical for advanced treatment, where he later died. University proctor Mehedi Hasan Sohag said he was at Dhaka Medical and confirmed that the student had died. Sohag said the university would discuss the next steps with Arafat’s family.