Varsity suspends tainted employees

A student works hard for an entire year and such an act lays to waste all his efforts in no time.

The University of Rajasthan (RU) on Tuesday suspended the two professors and another employee who were arrested by the Special Operations Group (SOG) of the state police on Monday in connection with a paper leak case.

“We received a letter from the SOG on the basis of which we suspended professors Govind Pareek and Jagdish Prasad Jat, and Nandlal Saini, a section officer in the secrecy wing,” said university vice chancellor and Jaipur divisional commissioner Rajeshwar Singh.

Pareek is a professor of accountancy and business statistics (ABST), and Jat is an associate professor and head of department of geography.

In a separate incident, the anti-corruption bureau (ACB) last week arrested another professor of the university for taking bribe from one of his research scholars for releasing his fellowship money.

Mahipal Yadav, an associate professor in the Sanskrit department, was caught in a trap laid by the ACB on April 12.

The university later suspended Yadav.

In the paper leak case, the SOG had found five papers to have been leaked, of which three were of RU — two of BA geography and one of MA ABST.

The university has not received official information from the SOG about the leaked papers. “We’ve written to the SOG and sought information about the papers that have been leaked. The leaked papers will most likely be conducted again,” said the vice chancellor.

He said the leaks happened despite the university reinforcing security measures this year.

Miffed with the recent developments, students said they have brought disrepute to the university.

“It is because of incidents like these that the university’s reputation has taken a blow. If you score 80% marks here in graduation and seek admission in other universities, they’ll say that RU’s 80% is equivalent to 60%,” said Shivam Shukla, a student of MSc (mathematics).

“When professors and heads of departments themselves are leaking exam papers, what can one say about the university’s state of affairs,” said Yogesh Jangir, another student of the same course.

“A student works hard for an entire year and such an act lays to waste all his efforts in no time. We urge the vice chancellor to take strict action against the accused professors,” said Ramjilal Choudhary, a student of dramatics at the university.