The Criminal Investigation Department (CID) has said question papers of the medical and dental admission tests were leaked repeatedly from the press under the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS).
CID Senior Assistant Superintendent of Police Sumon Kumar Das disclosed the matter at a press briefing over the arrest of five members of a question-leaking ring at CID headquarters on Thursday.
At the time, senior officials of the CID cyber crime unit, including DIG Shah Alam, were also present.
The five people, including the mastermind of the ring Jasim Uddin were arrested by CID from different parts of the country between July 15 and July 20. The other arrestees are -- Parvez Khan, Jakir Hossain Dipu, Sanwar Hossain and Mohaiminul Islam Bandhan.
“Initially, they came to know through various sources that the question papers of medical and dental admission testes were printed from the press under the Department of Health since 1988,” the police official said.
“Members of this ring were linked to this press or some of them had family members associated with the press. We primarily suspect that the ring used their connection with the press and leaked the question papers,” he added.
“We will continue to investigate this and will inform you about this soon,” he further added.
The police official also informed that an investigation into question paper leaks has been going on for a long time. During the investigation, they found that many people, including some students, were involved with the crime.
Till now, more than 50 people have been arrested by CID in this connection.
As the investigation progressed, CID officials learnt that two persons – Sanwar and Bandhan – were involved in the Dhaka University and medical admission test question leaks. Later, CID arrested both of them from Dhaka’s Mohammadpur and Nator. That time, cheques of Tk2.27 crore were recovered from Bandhan.
“CID also learnt that a ring was actively working to leak questions papers for medical and dental admission tests only. Following a raid at Mirpur, Jasim, Jakir and Parvez were arrested,” he said.
He also said the arrested members of the organized gang were involved in leaking medical and dental admission test question papers from the printing press digitally in exchange of money from 2013 to 2018.
The CID has filed a case against 150 to 200 people, including 14 named, with Mirpur police station.
“We know that there is a circle of 50 people active here. We are working on capturing the whole cycle,” he added.
Savings certificates worth Tk 2.27 crore, 39 cheques worth Tk 2.65 crore, 14 mobile phones, three cars and two houses were recovered from ringleader Jasim. Besides, cheques worth Tk84 lakh from various banks were also recovered from Parvez and FDR, and cheques worth Tk57 lakh were recovered from Jakir, he further added.
Back in 2017, a case filed with Shahbagh Police Station prompted CID to investigate the question paper leak of Dhaka University’s admission test.
Later, CID arrested 48 people for alleged involvement and of them, 47 gave confessional statements before the court. CID also filed a charge-sheet against 125 people in the case.
In 2018, CID cyber police unit resumed the investigation after receiving allegations of leaking the admission test question paper of Dhaka University’s 'D' unit. CID was able to arrest 17 people, including the ringleader, he said.
Sumon also said a case was filed against the respective gang with Shahbagh police station. Eight of them gave confessional statements before the court. But for a long time, two of the culprits, Sanwar and Badhan remained at large.
During the investigation of the case, the cyber police arrested Sanwar on July 19. Others were arrested later.
