UPSSSC exam paper leak: 11 including mastermind held
Employees of UPSSSC and printing press under scanner
LUCKNOW: The UP Subordinate Service Selection Commission (UPSSSC) recruitment examination scheduled for Sunday morning was postponed after authorities received information that the question paper was leaked.
The UP Special Task Force (STF) arrested 11 people, including a primary school teacher suspected to be the mastermind behind the leak of the tubewell operators’ recruitment exam paper, from Meerut on Sunday morning. The recruitment examination was scheduled to be held at 364 centres across the state. The commission said the fresh examination schedule would be announced soon.
SSP STF, Abhishek Singh said the arrested included five exam aspirants and six involved in leaking the paper. He further identified the primary school teacher, Sachin Chowdhary, as the mastermind. Chowdhary belongs to Meerut and was posted in Amroha, said the police.
Singh said Chowdhary used his connections to sell the leaked question paper for around Rs 7 lakh each. Police had laid out a plan to catch Chowdhary redhanded while he handed over the leaked papers to exam aspirants about 15 hours before the test.
Government authorities were alerted about the leak after the questions in the papers seized from the arrested people matched those in the real question papers, Singh said. Subsequently, authorities announced their decision to postpone the examination.
Singh said the STF team also recovered around Rs 15 lakh, admit cards of several examinees and over a dozen mobile phones from the arrested people.
According to the police, Chowdhary frequently made phone calls to specific numbers over the past few days. Police suspect that he was corresponding with those involved in leaking the questions.
“An FIR of fraud and forgery has been registered against the arrested people and other unidentified persons in Meerut,” informed Singh.
Meanwhile, UPSSSC examination controller lodged a separate FIR of fraud and forgery against unidentified people in Vibhuti Khand police station in Lucknow.
The tubewell operators’ exam was scheduled for a total of 3,210 vacancies and nearly two lakh aspirants had applied for it. As soon as the news of the exam being postponed broke, students began protesting outside the exam centres.
LUCKNOW: UP Special Task Force (STF) sleuths are still clueless from where alleged mastermind, Sachin Singh Chowdhary, a primary school teacher, had arranged question papers of tubewell operators’ recruitment examination.
“There are chances of question paper leak from three places – the eight treasuries across the state where the papers were kept, the printing press where these were printed and when the papers were set at UP Subordinate Service Selection Commission. But we are not sure about the source of question paper leak,” said a senior STF official.
He said UPSSSC is the nodal agency to conduct the examination for direct recruitment to all group ‘C’ posts as may be specified by the state government by notification in this behalf.
The official said Chowdhary feigned ignorance over the source of leaked question papers.
During interrogation, the alleged mastermind said he could only identify the person who handed him over the papers but could not reveal anything about his whereabouts.
The STF is searching for the person on the basis of initial information given by Chowdhary.
Moreover, Chowdhary’s police custody remand would be sought from court, if required, added the official.
He said initial probe suggested that the question papers were leaked before they were taken to the treasury on Saturday night as the STF team had information about the leak that day in the afternoon and two separate teams were tracking the suspect.
“Probe suggested either the paper was leaked when it was set or while being transported
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Probe suggested either the paper was leaked when it was set or while being transported from the printing press to the treasury
A SENIOR STF OFFICIAL
from the printing press to the treasury,” he emphasised.
The STF official said the involvement of some employees of UPSSSC is under scanner while the role of employees of the printing press is also being probed.
Earlier, the STF arrested 11 people including Chowdhary who were allegedly involved in leaking question papers of tubewell operators’ recruitment exam from Meerut on Sunday morning.
The examination, which was scheduled at 364 centres across the state, was cancelled.
The UPSSSC stated that the fresh schedule for the exam would be announced soon.