ILO consultant demands separate BCS exams for indigenous, tribal people in Bangladesh

A technical consultant of the International Labour Organization (ILO) has demanded separate government job entry exams for tribal and indigenous people in Bangladesh for an“effective” use of quota.

Barrister Raja Devasish Roy made the recommendation as an ILO study carried out under his supervision released on Thursday showed that nearly 9O percent of the reserved seats for those groups go unfilled.

Currently 5 percent of Class I, II, III and IV government jobs are set aside for indigenous and tribal peoples.

“If you assess them on the same day, in the same room and with the same way, then there is no meaning of keeping quotas for them,” he said, adding that the basic education structure of the indigenous is not so strong to compete with the other general students.

Programme Coordinator of Maleya Foundation, an NGO which works with the indigenous people, Uchacha-A Chak Usha, said the quota in civil service is applicable only in viva.

“But the candidate has to face the same preliminary and written exams. But when they prepare for the exams, they have to face teasing and taunts from the other candidates in the coaching centre that ‘you need not to be worried, you have quota’”.

“We have to implement this quota from the beginning of the exam,” she suggested.

The Ministry of Chittagong Hill Tracts Affairs and International Labour Organization jointly organised the workshop on “Study Findings on Job Reservation Policies for Indigenous and Tribal Peoples in the Civil Service of Bangladesh”.

The study was an analysis of different types of studies on the issue. It came out when there is demand of dismantling quota system in the public service entry exam.

State Minister for Chittagong Hill Tracts Affairs Bir Bahadur Ushwe Sing, Principal Secretary of the Prime Minister’s Office Dr Kamal Abdul Naser Chowdhury, Secretary for Bangladesh Public Service Commission Aktari Mamtaz, Secretary for Chittagong Hill Tracts Affairs Naba Bikram Kishore Tripura and ILO Bangladesh Office Deputy Director Gagan Rhajbhandari were also present, among others at the event.

The ILO deputy director said they supported this “comprehensive study” so that it can be used as “an advocacy instrument and serve as a basis for policy dialogue towards improving or revising the job quota policy”.

He said Bangladesh is a party to ILO Indigenous and Tribal Populations Convention No. 107 which obliges the state to adopt special measures to ensure protection of ITPs’ rights with regard to recruitment and conditions of employment.

It has also ratified ILO Discrimination Convention No. 111, which focuses on eliminating discrimination in employment and occupations.

“Thus both ILO Conventions justify the measures of the ITP job reservation policy and practices in recruiting ITPs in Bangladesh,” he said.

The state minister hailed the study and said this would help them to make policies.

“We cannot solve problems over night, but this type of evidence would help us to solve the problems,” he said, adding that once indigenous people could not be enrolled in police service despite having courage and education level, only because of their height.

“Then when we brought it to the attention of our Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, she lowered their eligibility height two inches than the other candidates. Now they are doing good job,” he said, for example.

The principal secretary said there are lot of debates since long about the quota system in the civil service, “but end of the day we have to ensure minimum standard of our bureaucracy”.

“We cannot always consider candidates based on their origin,” he said, suggesting them to strengthen their education system so that they can compete more in the public service exams.

The study report covers broad aspects of the reservation or “quota” policy of the government for the recruitment of those marginalised population in government service and the status of its implementation.

According to study findings there is no single formal governmental policy document on their quotas.

The report also suggested enhancing access to high quality primary, secondary and tertiary education, including mother tongue-based multilingual education at the primary level is a “crucial” step forward.

“This will help build longer-term capacity of the candidates for both government and private jobs, on merit basis as well as for reserved quota positions”.

Other recommendations include the reservation of a percentage of their quota for members of most socio-economically marginalised indigenous and tribal communities as well as for their women and people with disabilities.

Barrister Devasish Roy said the “job advertisement must be clear and mention the number of vacant quota posts”.

The ILO says its activities to support indigenous and tribal peoples in Bangladesh are carried out with the support of Sweden.