Police nab eight more over PU paper leak

Mangalore Today News Network

Bangalore, April 2, 2012: The Criminal Investigation Department (CID) said on Monday that its investigation into the series of II Pre-university question paper leaks has revealed the involvement of several government lecturers and employees.

The CID, which arrested 10 people in this connection so far, eight of them on Monday, has traced the leak to a sub-treasury in Kadur taluk in Chikmagalur district. R K Dutta, Director-General, CID, alleged that Munawwar Pasha, 31, a resource teacher at the Kadur Block Resource Centre, and H S Sunil Kumar, 34, a 2nd division clerk at the sub-treasury were the kingpins of the scam.

Elaborating on the manner in which the leak happened, Dutta said: “Chandrashekar, the Kadur sub-treasury officer, had left the keys of the treasury with Sunil Kumar who conspired with Pasha. Kumar allowed Pasha to enter the strong room on March 14, pull out a copy of the biology paper, take photocopies of it and replace it.”

Similarly, they photocopied the mathematics and physics question papers on the same day, Dutta said.

He charged that Pasha had collected Rs 1.5 lakh from various persons and that he sent these papers to Siddaramaiah, an assistant teacher at Chikmagalur and T Sonnappa, an assistant teacher at Doddakurubarahalli, Bangalore, who had allegedly mailed and faxed it to various people.

Siddaramaiah was arrested by the Chikmagalur police even before the case was entrusted to the CID. And the CID was able to track two sets of people through whom the papers had been in circulation and have arrested the eight people.

The agency has found that the keys to the strong room in the sub-treasury were found, in violation of rules, with Sunil Kumar even on Monday, when he was arrested.

“Not only was he entrusted with the keys when the leaks took place, but even today (Monday) the keys were with him,” a senior CID official said. Sub-treasury officer Chandrashekhar who was responsible for the keys had not offered a good explanation, the official said. The CID has made interim recommendations to the government to prevent such incidents. A full report along with the recommendations will be submitted to the government once the investigation is complete.

The agency is yet to verify if Chandrashekar was only negligent or if he had actually connived with the racketeers. Dutta, indicating that the investigation was not complete, said there could be more than one source of leakage and that more persons could be involved.

Culprits identified

Those arrested on Monday have been identified as Munawwar Pasha, 31, H S Sunil Kumar, 34, T Sonnappa, 37 an assistant teacher, C P Ramesh, 42, G Prahlad, 49, Anil Rahut, 27, Shashidhar, 28 and T Ravikumar, 28.

Yogeshwar, 36, and Siddaramaiah,44, were arrested earlier in Chitradurga and Chikmagalur respectively earlier.

 

Courtesy : Deccan Herald