Angry job seekers on Saturday locked the main gate of the Kushtia Civil Surgeon鈥檚 office over allegations of corruption, question paper leak, and irregularities in a recruitment test held on Friday.
The protesters gathered at about 1:00pm on Saturday on NS Road, blocked the entry to the office and staged a demonstration demanding the immediate cancellation of the test and holding a fresh, transparent re-examination.
The examination, held on October 24, was for 115 government posts (Grade 11鈥�12) under the Civil Surgeon鈥檚 Office and affiliated health facilities. Of the 16,789 registered candidates, only about half appeared in the test.
Public outrage erupted after a viral video showed several dozen youths entering and hastily leaving a house in Kushtia city just hours before the test.
The viral video clip shows that when journalists arrived at the scene and asked whether the youths were examinees, the youths ran away without answering the question.
The house belongs to Dr Hossain Imam, a resident medical officer at Kushtia General Hospital, and it fuelled the suspicions of organised cheating.
Mostafizur Rahman, a former leader of the Anti-Discrimination Student Movement, said that they had planned to hold a protest on October 26 as they had feared that the authorities might publish the result without any delay.
鈥業f this corrupt process is not stopped today, we will paralyze the entire district on Sunday,鈥� he warned.
Civil Surgeon Sheikh Mohammad Kamal Hossain was in the office while the protesters blocked the office.
He has formally reported the incident to the Directorate General of Health Services and the health ministry, stating that the viral video had damaged public trust, though the test was held across 14 centers with full security.
The civil surgeon denied his involvement in the incident and said, 鈥楾he house has multiple private dormitories. Candidates stayed there. I don鈥檛 know why they ran away when journalists arrived there.鈥�