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deep sorrow at his passing.

Students of the Economics department voiced anger and grief, questioning the systemic failures behind such recurring tragedies.

Mir Jaber Soyad, a third-year student of the department, recalled a simple moment that now carries unbearable weight.

“Come, let’s take a picture -- two brothers. We’ll upload it after 20 years,” he remembered Rayan as saying.

“But brother, 20 years didn’t pass, just one year did. This is not right. Not for you. Not for us. May Allah grant you Jannah. Your smile will stay in my heart forever,” he wrote.

Rayan’s presence was woven into many corners of campus life. “There are memories everywhere,” wrote Al-Beruni Rajan, a student of Anthropology department. “I don’t know how to face any of it now.”

The accident occurred around 5:15pm on Wednesday, when a Dhaka-bound passenger bus, waiting to cross the Padma, lost control and plunged off a pontoon into the river at Daulatdia ferry ghat. Till yesterday, 26 bodies had been recovered, including Rayan’s.

Calling the incident a “structural killing”, former JU professor Anu Muhammad argued that such tragedies are not mere accidents.

“The reasons behind these repeated losses are known and solvable. Yet we have not had a responsible government willing to address them structurally,” he wrote on Facebook.

JU Vice-Chancellor Prof Mohammad Kamrul Ahsan also expressed deep sorrow over Rayan’s death.