New Delhi — In what appears to be a sweeping anti-corruption drive in higher education, the Bangladesh government has removed the heads of four public universities for their alleged involvement in corruption and administrative irregularities, a local newspaper reports.

Three of the four university chiefs — Mosharraf Hossain Miah of Bangladesh Agricultural University, Abul Khair of the Noakhali University of Science and Technology, and Abdul Latif Masum of the Patuakhali University of Science and Technology — were dismissed on Tuesday. The fourth, Altaf Hossain of Rajshahi University, was dismissed last week.

The officials were removed on the recommendations of the country’s university regulator, which uncovered financial and administrative irregularities, especially in recruiting professors, during an investigation, the newspaper reports.

Last month Akbar Ali Khan, chairman of a body assigned to modernize old and ineffective laws, blamed corruption for the rot in Bangladesh’s education sector.

“Corruption is everywhere in Bangladesh, but that in education sector poses a major problem for the nation for its consequences in all other fields,” he said. —Shailaja Neelakantan