Confusion and protests marred the Bihar Public Service Commission (BPSC) preliminary test conducted at 390 centres across the state on Sunday.

Many BPSC candidates at D.B.R.K. Jalan High School, Patna City, on Sunday staged a protest at the examination centre against delay in distribution of question papers.

The students were also angry after they allegedly found seals of some of the envelopes, in which question papers were brought, open prior distribution. The students claimed that the paper has been leaked.

On receiving information about the students' protest, Chowk police station officers reached the spot to pacify the agitators.

"The students were protesting delay in distribution of question papers," said S.B. Singh, an officer at Chowk police station.

"They said the seals of envelopes of the question papers were broken." The police brought the situation under control. Apart from the students' protest at Jalan School, there were reports of protests at various centres over admit cards.

At many centres there were reports of candidates staging protests because many did not receive admit cards. Sources said across the state around 13,000 candidates have not received admit cards. The commission had stated that admit cards were not issued to candidates who had not filled their application forms correctly.

On Saturday too, many candidates staged a demonstration in front of the BPSC office for not having received admit cards a day before the preliminary examination. Over 2.45 lakh candidates will sit for the exam at 390 centres across the state for 642 government jobs, 244 meant for the Bihar administration.

The commission has, however, claimed there were no reports of any untoward incidents reported from any centre.

Prabhat Kumar Sinha, the secretary of BPSC, said: "There were some reports of students creating disturbances at Jalan High School. Barring the Patna City centre, there were no reports of any untoward incidents. There were no reports of question paper leak or cancellation of examination at any centre."

Students appearing for the preliminary test said the difficulty level of the question paper was average.

Rajiv Ranjan, a candidate, said: "The questions were average. Most of the questions were from history, catered to general knowledge and current affairs." The students had to answer 150 questions in two hours. Each questions carried a mark.

Khusbu, a candidate who had come from Varanasi, said: "Since the questions were easy the cut-off might be higher than the previous year."