A 25-member team of "schoolteachers" on November 1 flew to Korea to take part in the training course organised by DAEGU Metropolitan Office of Education.

Sources said among these 25, four are not even schoolteachers. They are

Director (training) of the Directorate of Secondary and Higher Secondary Education Dr Sirajuddin Ahmed, assistant private secretary to the former education minister Saiful Islam, Personal Officer of education secretary Monirul Islam Milon, and stenographer of joint secretary Golam Mostafa. Milon is also a leader of the education ministry employees association.

The 21 others include two teachers from the constituencies of the former minister and state minister for education, and others who are related to the ministry officials.

Sources in the National Front of Teachers and Employees (NFTE) said most of the participants are involved in BNP politics. Education ministry sources said this is a case of nepotism.

Shikkha Bhaban sources said five, four of who are not schoolteachers, were sent to "supervise" the remaining 20 teachers.

Former education minister Dr Osman Farruq and state minister Ehsanul Haque Milon played an active role in designing foreign trips that had started two months before the BNP government's tenure expired on October 27.

Among the latest participants, one is from Kandail High School, Karimganj, Kishoreganj, one from Gabtoli Pilot School, one from Ranihati MC High School, one from Tatuiya Adarsha School, Kachua, Chandpur. Karimganj is Farruq's constituency and Kachua is Milon's constituency. Gabtoli is late president Ziaur Rahman's village home, while Ranihati is the village home of the education secretary.

It turned out that most of the invited teachers came from remote areas and they were not at all computer literate. A ministry source said, "You may term it a pleasure trip. What is the use of a 10-day training for these people we don't know, but the delegates surely would enjoy."

A well-paced source at the ministry said Joint Secretary (Establishment) Mahfuzul Haque along with Deputy Secretary Nasreen Akhtar secretly designed the list. Mahfuz is now in Thailand and had been awarded frequent foreign trips for his 'Hawa Bhaban' connection. Nasreen was rewarded with 20 foreign trips in the last five years.

The sources said since Nasreen was promoted at the end of the four-party rule, she could not sign the papers and eventually directed the 'leave substitute' to do so.

Asked, Nasreen said she does not know anything. But, to justify this nepotism, Mahfuzul, Director (training) Sirajuddin Ahmed and she took a selection examination on the fourth floor of Banbais office at Nilkhet on October 5 to give it an authentic look.

Forty teachers were invited to attend this exam, but it is unknown how the 40 were selected in the first place.

Meanwhile, BNP-backed teachers' association president Selim Bhuiyan ruled out his involvement with the trip but expressed his regrets. "Those who served the minister in the field failed to get any benefit. But friends and families of the education ministry high-ups are getting all the trips," he said.

He demanded immediate investigation into these irregularities.

Officials close to the former education minister and state minister were frequently sent abroad as rewards for their loyalty.

Sources said prior to the ongoing trip, Dilara Hafiz, director general of Secondary and Higher Secondary Education and wife of former minister for commerce and water resources, went on a visit to Canada from October 13 to 25. The National Curriculum and Text Book Board trip was fixed for the DG of the Primary Education, the sources added.