Bihar TRE-4 exam to be held in single phase after student protests

The Bihar government has agreed to a key demand of protesting teacher aspirants, announcing that the fourth Teacher Recruitment Examination (TRE-4) conducted by the Bihar Public Service Commission (BPSC) will be held in a single phase.

Chief minister Samrat Choudhary made the announcement on Thursday, 27 August after meeting a delegation of protesters, who have been demonstrating in Patna over the examination format and wider concerns about recruitment processes.

The decision came days after job aspirants clashed with police during a march towards the chief minister's residence. The protesters, who had been demanding a single-stage teacher recruitment examination and a transparent recruitment process, attempted to break through police barricades, following which water cannons were used and police resorted to a lathi-charge.

The aspirants have been holding a sit-in at Patna's Gardani Bagh and had raised several demands relating to TRE-4, including conducting the examination in a single phase, greater transparency in the recruitment process, removal of negative marking and 100 per cent domicile-based recruitment.

The immediate dispute intensified after the BPSC announced that TRE-4 would be conducted in two stages. Aspirants have argued that a multi-stage examination could raise concerns over normalisation and have pressed the commission to hold a single examination.

The BPSC has announced 32,388 teaching posts under TRE-4, covering primary, middle and senior secondary schools. The recruitment process has become a major focus of student protests in the state amid wider concerns over the conduct of government-job examinations.

The agitation has also encompassed demands relating to other BPSC examinations. Student groups have alleged irregularities in the 70th BPSC preliminary examination and have demanded its cancellation, while the commission has rejected allegations of a paper leak and said a question paper circulating on social media was fake.

The protests escalated further after BPSC examination controller Rajesh Kumar Singh made a remark at a press conference that protesters objected to. The official later said the remark had been taken out of context and expressed regret if it had caused offence. The state government subsequently suspended him.

Against this backdrop, Choudhary said the government had been serious about the students' demands from the beginning. In a post on X on Thursday, he said, 'The government has been serious about the demands of students from the very beginning. Now, a decision has been taken.. that this year's TRE-4 examination will be conducted in a single phase.'

The chief minister also announced measures aimed at addressing wider grievances over the state's examination system. He said the government had constituted an expert committee on examination reforms to recommend improvements in the conduct of various examinations. The committee, chaired by a sitting judge of the Patna High Court, will also hear students' grievances relating to examinations.

'The state government has constituted an expert committee on examination reforms to recommend improvements in various exams. The panel, chaired by a sitting judge of the Patna High Court, will also hear the grievances of students related to various examinations,' Choudhary said in the post.

The government has also launched the Vidyaarthi Sahayata Portal and Vidyaarthi Sahayata Shivir programmes for the prompt resolution of students' complaints and grievances.

The announcement addresses one of the protesters' principal demands, but several other issues remain unresolved. Student groups have continued to raise concerns over recruitment transparency, examination procedures, domicile rules and alleged irregularities in government-job examinations.

With PTI inputs