Bangladesh moves to relax age eligibility for government jobs in pandemic

The government will allow those who turned 30 on Mar 25 amid the coronavirus shutdown to apply for government jobs.

Government job seekers will be provided with the opportunity, State Minister for Public Administration Farhad Hossain told reporters on Tuesday, citing a directive from the prime minister.

The Ministry of Public Administration sent a proposal to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina with a request to consider the age issue of job seekers. Hasina has approved the proposal sent by the ministry, said an official.

Bangladesh General Students' Council formed a human-chain in front of the National Press Club on Friday demanding that the maximum age for entering government jobs be raised to 35.

The ministry will determine the deadline for the people who turned 30 on Mar 25 to apply for government jobs, he said.

The Public Service Commission did not publish any job advertisement during the 66-day coronavirus shutdown.

The commission, however, published few advertisements for non-cadre jobs after the lockdown was lifted on May 30. The age limit for the applicants mentioned in those advertisements was 30 years on Jun 1.

JOBSEEKERS' WISHLIST

The jobseekers, however, see the new option as nothing compared to the setbacks they face due to the pandemic.

They argue that the crisis has hurt everyone and so the government should relax job age rules for everyone.

“I couldn’t apply because there was no job advert due to the pandemic. And I don’t know whether there will be any job posting in the remaining three months,” said Sanjida Islam, who turns 30 in December.

She could not prepare for recruitment tests either as she had to do business on the internet after losing her job as a private tutor amid the pandemic.

Mahfuzul Islam, who turned 30 in August, said he had lost three and a half years to session logjam and thesis at his university.

He had cleared some preliminary tests for government recruitment, but was yet to sit the written exams and viva and he does not like these jobs.

“I'd have landed a better job if the (job postings) were not halted in the first three months. Now I will have to regret all my life if I don’t get a good job,” he said.  

“We have long been demanding that the maximum age limit be lifted. Now that we've a situation, the ceiling should be raised to at least 32 years,” he added.