By Xinhua
Dhaka : The Bangladesh authorities decided to further lift the curfew imposed from Wednesday night on six major cities, announcing that there will be no curfew for 17 hours on Saturday.
A government handout Friday night said that the curfew will be lifted from 6 a.m. to 11 p.m. local time on Saturday in the six divisional cities including Dhaka Metropolitan City.
However, the curfew will be in place from 10 p.m. Friday after a break of 14 hours.
Thousands of city dwellers and traffic returned to streets in the capital during the 14-hour curfew-break Friday.
Witnesses said people crowded city markets to buy essentials on the weekend while Muslim devotees prayed at mosques. Most shops and markets were open.
Police sources said no major untoward incident happened since the curfew was clamped to cool down violent protests by students following beating up of a Dhaka University student by army men on the campus Monday.
As the student protests escalated resulting in one death and hundreds injured, the government shut down all universities and colleges in the country’s six divisional cities.