As part of their anti-quota movement, students have said they will continue their “Bangla Blockade,” or roadblocks at key points on the streets, on Monday. 

Nahid Islam, the movement's coordinator, made the announcement at 8pm on Sunday, saying the blockade would start at 3:30pm.

Earlier, the demonstrators said law enforcement had sat down for discussions with the chief coordinator of the movement, Nahid Islam, and key coordinators, Sarjis Alam and Hasnat Abdullah. 

However, after some time, Hasnat returned to Shahbagh and reported that they had been taken to meet with a team of representatives from the prime minister. 

Sarjis Alam said: "Our protest is not against the constitution. If we look at the distribution of seats in our parliament, we see that of the 350 seats, 50 are reserved, amounting to 14%. If the quota were 56%, there would be 196 reserved seats. When our parliament, representing the entire country, has a 14% quota, why should government jobs have a 56% quota?"

Meanwhile, Hasnat said: "To those who think we have political motives, you will not see us in any other movement if we succeed in this one. We will return to our studies, where we belong.

"We previously had a four-point demand, but from tomorrow, we will have just one demand: abolish unreasonable and discriminatory quotas in all grades, reduce the quotas to the minimum level for the backward groups mentioned in the constitution and reform the quota system by passing a law in parliament.'"

On the other hand, Nahid said they had been finally able to grab everyone's attention, including the prime minister's. "She once declared in favour of students in 2018, and we hope she will do the same again. We have no other option but to protest to claim our right."

"Our class and exam boycott will continue for an indefinite period. Blockades will be maintained at various points across the country. We went to Karwan Bazar from Shahbag today, and tomorrow we will pass Farmgate. We will gather at 3:30 tomorrow for our next activity."

From the evening onwards, demonstrators started gathering at Shahbagh from various points in the capital. In fulfilling their announced program demanding quota reform, they had blocked several key intersection in Dhaka. 

After announcing their next program, they began to leave Shahbagh, and traffic started to return to normal.

Standstill

Demanding the abolition of quotas in government jobs, students blocked several intersections in the capital from 3pm, including Nilkhet, Science Lab, Karwan Bazar, Banglamotor, Chankharpul and Agargaon. 

With various major intersections blocked one by one, the capital came to a standstill, with hundreds of vehicles halted on every road and thousands of people trying to reach their destinations on foot.

At the Banglamotor intersection, a woman named Afifa Firoz said she was heading home to Moghbazar with her child in a rickshaw from Science Lab. “However, the students stopped us at Banglamotor. Now, we cannot go anywhere.” 

Frustrated, a man named Sirajul Islam said many people were walking, questioning how one could stay in the same place for hours.

At the Panthapath intersection, two people, Mahmud and Juthi, said they had to walk from Paltan as no vehicles were moving.

Traffic Inspector (TI) Md Habib said in line with the commissioner's instructions, police were facilitating vehicle movement on alternative roads if the main roads were blocked. 

The protesting students blocked roads with national flags in their hands and on their heads, holding various placards and chanting different slogans.