A show-cause letter was issued to the doctor of a health centre in Jhalakathi over his Facebook posts yesterday.

Tipu Sultan of Dapdapia Union Health Centre in Nalchity upazila was issued the letter by Dr Shiuly Parvin, the health and family planning officer.

"You often mock and post unfavourable representations of the operations of the government's health division on Facebook," the letter reads.

It added that his Facebook posts were a violation of "civility" and government officers' code of conduct, which is a punishable offence.

The letter also pointed out that his Facebook posts violated the Government Servants (Discipline and Appeal) Rules-2018.

In a recent post, which has now been removed, he wrote about the government giving fake N95 masks to healthcare personnel that might have caused doctors to get infected.

He added that a large number of doctors have already died with Covid-19 and that he himself got infected on July 1.

On his Facebook timeline, Dr Sultan routinely posts about the importance of detecting asymptomatic coronavirus cases, news about the health sector, and articles from journals like The Lancet.

According to Government Servants (Discipline and Appeal) Rules-2018, which Dr Sultan is being penalised under, the grounds on which a civil servant can be penalised are "avoiding duty, ignoring orders, dishonesty, lodging false complaints, corruption, desertion and terrorism".

On April 23, Health Minister Zahid Maleque ordered health officials not to talk to the media.

Teachers, engineers and health workers have faced departmental action during the pandemic over Facebook posts criticising the authorities.

"We have examined Dr Sultan's social media presence and could not observe any status that is against the government in any way. If he is being given a show-cause for what he posts, then the same should be done for all doctors -- everyone shares content like this. There can be codes of conduct but freedom of expression cannot be restricted," said Dr Nirupam Das, chief administrator of the Bangladesh Doctors Foundation.

Dr Sultan is a graduate of Faridpur Medical College.