Authorities closed Bangladesh's Rajshahi University indefinitely after nearly 200 students and teachers were injured in clashes with police and pro-government activists, officials and witnesses said on Saturday.
They said violence erupted after authorities at the university in Rajshahi, 250 km (156 miles) north of Dhaka, called in police to disperse students protesting over an alleged intrusion by three men into a female dormitory on Friday night.
"The situation remained highly tense on the campus as most students still refused to leave," Abdul Muttalib, a Rajshahi resident, said by telephone late in the afternoon.
The vice-chancellor and his deputies could not be contacted immediately.
"The chaos started over a minor incident that university authorities neither confirmed nor denied," said a Rajshahi police official, who did not want to be named.
"But the situation worsened quickly and ran out of control after the protesters had turned on law enforcers."
Police used batons, tear gas and rubber bullets to scatter protesters around the 25,000-student university's administrative buildings and the residence of Vice-Chancellor Faisul Islam.
Angry students hurled brickbats and stones at police, battled activists supporting the police action and damaged nearly 40 vehicles on the campus and nearby streets. They also broke the doors and windows of several buildings, witnesses said.
As tension rose, authorities ordered the university closed indefinitely and told students to vacate the dormitories.
"The battle raged for hours, and nearly 200 students and some teachers have been injured. Some 50 injured have been taken to hospital," a reporter in Rajshahi, S.M. Humayun Kabir, told Reuters by telephone.
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