More than two dozen people have been killed in Bangladesh as a wave of student protests over jobs has exposed widespread fury against Sheikh Hasina’s authoritarian government and deep economic distress in the world’s second-largest garments exporter.

University students in the country of 170mn have for weeks been demanding the end of a controversial government job quota system they say benefits supporters of Sheikh Hasina’s ruling Awami League party and has become a symbol of the corruption that has flourished under her two-decade rule.

At least 39 people have been killed in the unrest, according to French news agency AFP, citing figures from local hospitals, with approximately two-thirds of the victims apparently wounded by police weapons including rubber bullets. Other news agencies and local media put the death toll at between 24 and 28.