First Day of SSC and Equivalent Examinations Concludes

The first day of the 2026 Secondary School Certificate (SSC), Dakhil, and equivalent examinations ended peacefully on Tuesday (21 April).

Examinations began at 10:00 AM and concluded at 1:00 PM at 3,885 centres nationwide, involving 30,666 educational institutions.

A total of 18,57,344 students are participating this year. Among them, 9,30,305 are male and 9,27,039 are female. Under the nine general education boards, 14,18,398 students appeared, while 3,04,286 sat under the Madrasa Education Board and 1,34,660 under the Technical Education Board.

Dhaka Education Board recorded the highest number of examinees with 3,66,650, while Sylhet Board had the lowest with 89,421.

As per the published schedule, the first day featured Bangla First Paper under the general boards, Quran Majid and Tajvid under the Madrasa Board, and Bangla-2 under the Technical Board.

Education and Primary & Mass Education Minister Dr. A N M Ehsanul Haque Milon said strict cyber monitoring was in place to prevent question leaks. “We are monitoring through cyber crime units. We have lists of those who collect question papers from police stations. We have set up a monitoring cell and created a WhatsApp group with DCs, UNOs, and others,” he said.

The minister added that the Public Examination Act 1980 has been updated and sent to the Law Ministry to include digital crime provisions and revise fines.

Regarding answer script evaluation, he assured that examiners have been given sufficient time and that the evaluation process is being reviewed for fairness. He clarified that no instructions have been issued to award extra marks on humanitarian grounds.

No major incidents of question leaks or irregularities were reported on the first day.