The social media users in Bangladeshi, especially Facebook, are joining hands to protest the incident of humiliation of a school teacher in Narayanganj who was recently publicly humiliated in presence of an MP.

The Facebook users posted photos of them holding their ears with the caption “sorry sir” on social media platforms to express their solidarity with the teacher who had been made to do squats holding his ears in the presence of a local lawmaker allegedly for making derogatory comments on religion.

The punishment is widely criticised even when used on children, and applying it to an adult and a teacher has been regarded as unbearably humiliating.

Bangladeshis, including some celebrities, posted themselves holding their ears, in solidarity with Shyamal Kanti Bhakta, the Narayanganj headmaster who was humiliated in front of many people by forcing him to do the ‘uthbosh’.

Shyamal, headmaster of Piyar Sattar Latif High School in Narayanganj’s Bandar upazila, was physically assaulted last Friday by members of the school’s management committee.

Education Minister Nurul Islam Nahid and Law Minister Anisul Huq both decried such humiliation of a teacher and termed it a ‘punishable offence’, but the Bangladeshi public went one step further to defend the honour of a school teacher.

Shahriar Alam, state minister for foreign affairs, in a Facebook status wrote, “I am expressing deep condemnation over the humiliation of the Narayanganj teacher. The honourable education minister gave us the assurance of taking action upon an investigation. Hope, [action] would be taken soon.”