The government has cancelled the gazette published on October 15 for the 43rd Bangladesh Civil Service (BCS) recruitment and issued a new one, which excludes 168 candidates from various cadres.

According to the new gazette from the Ministry of Public Administration issued yesterday, 1,896 candidates recommended by the Public Service Commission (PSC) have been appointed to entry-level positions in various cadres.

Appointed candidates have been directed to report to their assigned offices under respective ministries by January 15, it read.

"If they do not join on the scheduled date, it will be considered they will not join the job and their appointment letter will be considered cancelled," the notification also read.

On October 15, out of the 2,163 candidates recommended by the PSC, the ministry appointed 2,064 candidates for cadre posts and put on hold the results of 99 candidates.

Now, 168 candidates have been further excluded.

Among those excluded, 26 were previously selected for the administration cadre, eight from the police cadre, and three from the foreign cadre.

With the latest exclusions, a total of 267 candidates have now been left out of the 43rd BCS recruitment.

On December 26, 2023, the PSC published the final results of the 43rd BCS, recommending the recruitment of 2,805 cadre and non-cadre candidates.

However, after the fall of the Awami League government on August 5, the interim administration began re-evaluating the background of 255 candidates.

The circular for the 43rd BCS exams was floated on November 30, 2020.

On October 29, 2021, over 435,000 candidates took the preliminary BCS exam across various centres across the country. The results were published on January 20, 2022, with 15,229 candidates passing the preliminary.

The written exams were held in July that year, and 9,841 candidates passed the written test.