NOIDA: Sahil had cleared his Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) prelims in 2020. Merit wasn’t his problem. He needed money to prepare for the mains.
The 22-year-old had come all the way from Jind in Haryana in 2020 to Delhi’s Mukherjee Nagar, among the lakhs who base themselves in the capital each year to crack the fiercely competitive exams, but of whom less than 1% make the cut. Nevertheless, the ecosystem of coaching centres, teachers and a peer group keeps drawing in the numbers.
Sahil, a farmer’s son, had to scrounge to enrol in a course to prepare for the UPSC mains — each coaching centre has a different fee structure going up to a few lakhs — and a rent of Rs 6,000 for his shared accommodation, according to the police investigation.
In an environment where paths regularly cross, acquaintances are easy to strike up and bonds are forged over shared struggles and personal hardships, it didn’t take long for Sahil to blend in. Soon, he learnt that it wasn’t just the coaching centres that were keeping an eye on their trainees.
A group of ‘exam solvers’ approached him, offering immediate cash if he agreed to appear as a ‘dummy candidate’ in an exam. Sahil needed the money. He agreed.
But as a professional ‘solver’ – moniker for a person who appears for an exam in place of the original candidate – Sahil had a short run. He was arrested on April 12 last year from ION digital zone, an examination centre in Noida’s sector 62.
Since April last year, 41 people, including ‘solvers’ deployed by gangs that infiltrated centres for various exams, have been arrested in Noida alone.
Vikrant Panwar, the investigating officer in Sahil’s case, told TOI three others were arrested along with Sahil. “During questioning, we found that Sahil was a diligent student preparing for the UPSC (Mains). He was approached by Sandeep, a fellow student at his coaching centre. Sandeep, it seems, slowly won Sahil’s trust and persuaded him to appear as a dummy candidate,” Panwar said. Sandeep is absconding.
Police said most exam gangs had a similar modus operandi. They target bright students struggling to fund their dream of landing a coveted government job. Since the money is good, the gangs enjoy a good success rate in building their pools of solvers. Sahil, for instance, was paid Rs 30,000 as advance and was promised another Rs 70,000 after he appeared in an exam. On the day of the Staff Selection Commission (SSC) exam in Sector 62, he was handed a forged admit card. He was, however, caught while the admit cards were being checked before the test.
In his statement to the police, Sahil has stated, “Being from a financially weak family, I was targeted and lured into appearing for someone. In return, I was offered a hefty amount, which I thought would help me in my preparations for the UPSC (Mains).”
Like Sahil, 25-year-old Rupesh was baited into becoming a solver. He, too, was under financial stress — he had to repay a loan his family in Bihar had taken to send him to Delhi. Rupesh was arrested on August 9 from a test centre in Noida. “While most of the youths arrested so far had come to Delhi to prepare for competitive exams, there were a few mediators among them who were from Charkhi Dadri in Haryana. We have got in touch with our counterparts there,” ACP (Noida 2) Rajneesh Verma told TOI.
The mediators, additional DCP Ranvijay Singh said, are mostly government employees. “Some of them are in positions like junior statistical officers or assistant sub-inspectors. Their task is to identify vulnerable candidates with the promise of clearing the exams on their behalf. Some of them also help in forging documents. The candidates are charged Rs 2-3 lakh depending on the nature of the exam,” Singh said. Some of the mediators arrested have been identified as Shiv Ram Singh, a CRPF head constable, Vikas, an ASI with Delhi Police, and Bhavani Sharma, a retired CRPF constable.
Dummy candidates, or ‘solvers’, have been found appearing in exams for the Staff Selection Commission, the Indian Coast Guard, Haryana Staff Selection Commission, Central Airmen Selection Board, UP Secondary Education Service Selection Board (Trained Graduate Teacher), etc.
“The gangs had been active in several states, such as Delhi, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh, for the past several years,” Singh said, adding, “Our teams have been working tirelessly to make sure the exams are conducted in a fair manner. Students should not use unfair means to get government jobs. They will only land in trouble and spoil their careers.”
All the 41 people arrested since April last year have been booked under sections 419 (cheating by personation), 420 (cheating and dishonestly inducing delivery of property), 467 (forgery of valuable security, will, etc), 468 (forgery for purpose of cheating), 471 (using forged documents as genuine), 120(B) (criminal conspiracy), and 34 (common intention) of the IPC and under provisions of the Uttar Pradesh Public Examinations (Prevention of Unfair Means) Act, 1998.
But the investigations, now almost running into a year, haven’t reached the roots of these gangs with the masterminds of most gangs absconding. “In one of the cases, our team had arrested 18 persons, many of the candidates, for leaking the Central Teacher Eligibility Test (CTET) question paper. The gang also provided answer keys to candidates for Rs 2.5 lakh to Rs 3 lakh,” Verma said, adding that all these arrests were made from the ION digital zone, a test centre.
DCP Rajesh G said the arrests had also brought the authorities at the test centre under the scanner. “The centre has identified several impersonators following tip-offs and alerted the cops. Currently, it has set up an internal committee to deal with such cases,” he added.
Pawan Kumar Dabas, who has filed complaints against several impersonators on behalf of the ION exam centre, said several candidates have been caught using Bluetooth devices or ‘solvers’ to write their papers.
“While this malice needs to be checked, on several occasions, police don’t cooperate and hesitate to register FIRs when such cases are reported,” said Dabas, who is the proprietor of Catalyst, the centre’s legal consultant and advisor.
