Biman officials took up to Tk7 lakh for leaking question: Police

The officials of Biman Bangladesh Airlines, who were arrested for leaking the question of a recruitment test of the state-owned airlines, collected payoffs, ranging from Tk2 to Tk7 lakh per question, from aspirants.

They even collected signatures on non-judicial stamp papers to misappropriate lands from the job seekers, said Mohammad Harun Or Rashid, additional commissioner of the Detective Branch (DB) of Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP), in a press briefing at the DMP media centre in Dhaka on Saturday.

The DB police and National Security Intelligence (NSI) in a joint drive arrested five Biman officials – Md Jahangir Alam, 36, Mohammad Mahfuz Alam Bhuiyan, 31, Md Enamul Haque, 27, Aolad Hossain, 29 and Harunur Rashid, 40, from the capital's Kaola area on Friday. 

The law enforcers also recovered soft and hard copies of the question paper, bank cheques, stamped documents, four diaries, admit cards of the examinees, mobile phone sets and cash from the arrestees during the drive. 

According to DB, the one-hour-long recruitment test of Biman was scheduled to be held on Friday from 3-4 pm. On Thursday night, detectives came to learn that the question of the test has been leaked. 

After identifying the culprits, the detectives started a drive and recovered a total of 100 leaked questions from their possessions. 

During primary interrogation, the arrestees confessed that they started to plan for leaking the questions since Biman issued a circular for recruitment. They collected the original question by working with Biman high-ups responsible for preparing, printing and storing questions. Later they sold the question paper to the job seekers through WhatsApp. 

Meanwhile, Biman Bangladesh Airlines has formed an inquiry committee over the incident. Biman sources said a three-member committee had been formed led by its chief financial officer.