Despite strong and repeated demands from the education boards, no move for digitalisation of the state-owned printing press is visible yet, leaving the question paper leakage issue neglected.
"There is no move visible for automation of the Bangladesh Government Press (BG Press) that prints the question papers of all public examinations," said Dhaka Education Board Chairman Prof Dilara Hafiz.
She also said full-fledged automation of the press is urgently needed to ensure security of the question papers of public examinations.
Earlier, a high-profile committee, headed by an additional secretary, made a set of recommendations, including the automation of BG Press for safeguarding the question papers.
Other suggestions included introducing a three-tier security system (password of users, biometrics and user access card) for stopping leakage of the question papers, and preparing 20 sets of probable question papers for each subject.
"Majority of the recommendations have been adopted, except the automation of BG Press, as it requires a significant investment," the board chairman said.
"We've taken a set of measures, including printing of sum 20 sets of question papers for each subject, but still there are scopes for leakage," she added.
The issue came to discussion when some question papers of the Higher Secondary Certificate (HSC) and its equivalent examinations were allegedly leaked last year.
Dhaka Education Board Controller Srikanta Kumar Chanda said, "Still there are scopes for unscrupulous officials, working with the printing process, to leak out the question papers, as they calculate the papers for final packaging."
"Once BG Press gets automated, the questions will be counted automatically, and their security will be ensured."
He also said they have recently sent a proposal to the Ministry of Education, recommending the necessary steps in this connection.
The government must work in this regard, as the issue is very sensitive, Mr Srikanta opined.
 "We also seek intervention of the Prime Minister over the issue," he noted.
When contacted, Director General (DG) of Directorate of Secondary and Higher Secondary Education Prof Fahima Khatun said the automation of BG Press will definitely ensure security of the question papers.
"Automation will help reduce involvement of a number of people in the printing process; therefore, the risk will also decline," said the former chairperson of Dhaka Education Board.
She said once the press gets automated, no manual process will be required from printing to packaging. Besides, the question papers will be enclosed with Radio Frequency Identification (RFID), and only the authorized person will be able to open these by using RFID control chip at the scheduled time.
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