Patna: Police baton charge on BPSC candidates

Patna, 29 December

The Bihar Public Service Commission (BPSC) candidates protesting against the demand of re-conducting the 70th Common Competitive Examination (CCE) at Gandhi Maidan here today were also lathi-charged by the police in addition to using water cannons.

According to the information received, thousands of students gathered at Gandhi Maidan here today regarding the alleged benemies in the examination held on December 13. After demonstrating here, they started marching towards JP Golambar, to stop them, the police used water cannons and lathi-charged them. Meanwhile, heavy police force was deployed to deal with any kind of situation. Jan Suraj Party founder Prashant Kishore also participated in this demonstration. He offered his full support to the protesting students and candidates. Earlier, Kishore was also invited to the ‘Chhatra Parliament’ (Student Parliament) to be held at Gandhi Maidan on Saturday, so that the students’ demands and future plans could be discussed with them. However, the administration refused to approve the program.

At the beginning of these protests, which have entered the 10th day, there were allegations of a paper leak at the Bapu exam center. However, BPSC re-conducted the exam in that exam center. The commission said that the examination has been conducted again at the center where the allegations were made, but it is not possible to cancel the entire examination. On Friday, the Controller of BPSC Examination, Rajesh Kumar Singh, again clarified the Commission’s position that the CCE examination will not be canceled under any circumstances. He said that the mains exam will be held in April itself. He urged the candidates to focus on their mains exam preparation.

Despite this appeal of the controller of BPSC examination, the struggle of the candidates is continuing regarding the demand of re-conducting the exam and even today they were demanding to re-conduct the exam. – IANS