Belgrade, Serbia—— Tens of thousands of protesters led by university students held a raucous rally outside the headquarters of Serbian state television in Belgrade on Friday to protest against what they said was the broadcaster's pro-government bias.

The rally came a day after a student was seriously injured when a driver rammed his car into a crowd of protesters.

The demonstration was one of the largest in years against alleged pro-government bias at RTS television, and was part of wider protests that erupted after a concrete canopy collapsed in the northern city of Novi Sad in November, killing 15 people.

Protesters whistled, booed and jeered, expressing their anger over state television reports that President Aleksandar Vucic had accused students of accepting payments from foreign secret services with the intention of overthrowing him and his populist government by force.

Protesters observed a 15-minute silence to commemorate the victims of the railway station canopy collapse accident. They also chanted for a general strike across the Balkan countries.

Many Serbs blamed the deadly collapse on rampant corruption in the country, which led to sloppy renovations of the Novi Sad station building. This is part of a wider agreement with Chinese state-owned enterprises involved in several infrastructure projects in the Balkan country.

The canopy collapse has become a flashpoint for broader dissatisfaction with the president's increasingly authoritarian rule, reflecting public demands for democratic change.

Since the fatal tree canopy collapse on November 1, daily protests have been held in Novi Sad, Belgrade and other cities across the country, sometimes turning violent.

A car driver fled the scene in central Belgrade on Thursday, throwing the young woman he hit onto the roof of his car before falling to the ground with a bloody head injury.

Police said they detained the driver and charged him with attempted murder. There have been several such incidents since the protests and traffic jams, but this was the first serious injury.

Tensions have risen since incidents, including one on Friday when a man threatened protesters in Novi Sad with a knife. Separately, riot police expelled a group of opposition politicians from the town's town hall after they occupied it in support of student protesters.

Vucic called opposition officials "hooligans" and reiterated his promise that they would never come to power through force.

He sided with those opposed to daily street protests, saying their freedom of movement was jeopardized by daily traffic blockades. His opponents say Vucic's fiery counter-protest rhetoric has created an atmosphere of violence in the country.