Two youths arrested over SSC question paper leaks

Rapid Action Battalion (Rab) arrested two members of a group on the capital's Indira Road on Thursday night for their alleged involvement in leaking question papers of SSC examinations.

The arrestees are Redwan Ahmed, 24, son of Abdul Mannan from Chowgachha in Jessore; and Belal Hossain, 23, son of Hazrat Ali from Jhikargachha in the district, said a Rab press release.

Acting on a tip-off, Rab conducted a drive and arrested them in front of a shop near Dhaka Oriental College around 11:05pm.

During primary interrogation, Rab came to know that they are the students of a private university in the capital.

They got involved with a group titled, “Chemistry-2018”, on Facebook and Messenger.

Later on, they started selling question papers via bKash to the students after collecting those papers from the administrators of the group.

They also admitted that they did the same in the past and took a lot of money from the candidates of different examinations.

The two were arrested amid the incidents of question paper leaks during the ongoing SSC exams in the country.

Earlier in the day, the High Court formed two committees -- one judicial and another administrative -- to find out those involved in the leak of question papers of public exams and make recommendations for preventing such leaks.

Formation of the committees came after the HC had heard a writ petition filed by four Supreme Court lawyers, seeking its directive on the authorities to prevent future unfair practice in public exams.

The judicial committee will be headed by Dhaka District and Sessions Judge SM Kuddus Zaman while the administrative one by Prof M Kaykobad of Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (Buet).

The committees with five members each have to start work within a week upon receipt of certified copies of the HC order.

They will submit reports to the court in 30 days after conducting investigations.

The judicial committee also includes chief judicial magistrates of Narayanganj and Gazipur, and two deputy secretaries of the law and the education ministries.

Talking to this newspaper, Jyotirmoy Barua, counsel for the writ petitioners, said the other four members of the administrative committee are Buet teacher Prof Sohel Rahman; the director general of the Directorate of Secondary and Higher Education; an IT specialist and a deputy inspector general of the CID of police.