Nahid warns against question leaks

With the HSC and equivalent examinations beginning tomorrow, the government has taken various initiatives to stop question paper leak.

Education Minister Nurul Islam Nahid urges the guardians to keep their children away from such immoral activities.

During a programme at Dhaka University yesterday, the minister said no one will be spared if they are found guilty of leaking questions.

Addressing the programme, the ministry Secretary Sohrab Hossain said the authorities, including of Bangladesh Bank and law enforcing agencies, are working to stop question leaks.

In this regard, police have formed five special teams.

These teams will monitor the online and virtual platforms round-the-clock, Shaikh Nazmul Alam, joint commissioner of Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP), told The Daily Star yesterday.

All units of police will keep the special teams updated with latest information, he said.

“We have already detected a new social media group trying to show its activities of question leaks,” he said, adding that they are hopeful the offenders will be arrested soon.

As part of the education ministry's measures to check the menace, coaching centres will be closed until the exam finishes. The envelope containing question papers will be sealed with a “security tape”.

If the envelope is opened before the exam, the authorities will be able to ascertain the fact, according to ministry officials.

Besides, question sets would be determined through lotteries, 25 minutes prior to the tests. Also, the examinees have been instructed to enter the centres 30 minutes before the exams begin.

The government took the initiatives as the question papers of almost all the tests of this year's SSC examinations had been leaked and circulated on Facebook pages hours before the tests began.

Meanwhile, terming coaching centres a “corruption hub”, Anti-Corruption Commission Chairman Iqbal Mahmud further urged the government, students, teacher and guardians to come forward to shut those down completely.

He was addressing a cultural programme at Osmani Memorial Auditorium. However, Coaching Association, Bangladesh, in a press release, said the ACC chairman cannot make such a comment without any investigation.