Bihar: BPSC Aspirants Stage Protest, Demand CBI Probe Into ‘Irregularities’

Patna: Hundreds of youths and students, mostly aspirants of Bihar Public Service Commission (BPSC) took to the streets on Wednesday in Patna and staged a protest demanding either a CBI inquiry into the alleged irregularities and ‘scam’ in the preliminary result or revised result soon.

Some of the protesters urged Chief Minister Nitish Kumar to intervene to resolve the issue.

With placards, posters and banners in their hands, hundreds of BPSC aspirants shouted slogans against top BPSC officials and blamed them for playing with the career of thousands of aspirants. The protesters expressed unhappiness over ‘total silence’ of the state government despite repeated protests by them on the issue.

The administration deployed heavy security at different places, however, no violence or untoward incident was reported.

The protesters have been demanding action against BPSC examination controller, Amarendra Kumar, alleging that he is a “major player” in the “scam that has been going on in BPSC for the last few years.”

“What is our crime, we are seeking a free and fair investigation into the scam in BPSC? But the government is not doing anything. It should come with a reply at least to clear the doubts in the mind of aspirants”, Ritesh Kumar, one of the protesters, told NewsClick.

Himamshu Singh said the aspirants had been protesting since a day after the BPSC preliminary results announced on November 17 over the alleged irregularities in cut-offs. After that, the commission was forced to publish another round of results with 15 more students qualifying for the test.

Both Ritesh and Himanshu questioned BPSC’s decision not to correct answers of nine questions and offering no assurance on releasing the result again.

Shalini Kumari, an aspirant, said not only this time, every year some trouble marks the BPSC preliminary exam and result. In May this year, the preliminary exam was cancelled due to a ‘question paper leak’ and now the high cut-off due to wrong questions in the exams. “The aspirants are not responsible for such a blunder. The government has hardly acted against top officials of BPSC who are responsible for the irregularities”, she told NewsClick.

The protesters recalled that state chief secretary Amir Subhani, during a meeting last month, had assured them that their demands would be fulfilled. “But till date, nothing has happened. We have no other option but to protest to draw the government’s attention”, Dilip Kumar, one of the leaders of the protest told NewsClick.

In August this year, civil service aspirants had protested against the new format of the commission and forced the state government to continue the old system with no change in examination. It was then reported that the Chief Minister had directed BPSC to do so.