BANGALORE: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Sunday arrested a chief vigilance officer of South Western Railway (SWR) and an advocate allegedly involved in leaking question papers of the Railway Recruitment Board exams.
They also arrested 13 candidates to whom the papers were leaked. A day before the exam, the candidates had been provided accommodation to prepare and also to ensure that they would not leak the question papers to others. The CBI is also on the lookout for a few other railway officials, including a divisional personnel officer, believed to be involved in the scam.
The arrests were made after raids on apartments in RT Nagar and Dinnur areas early on Sunday. The homes of the accused were also searched, and some question papers and cash of Rs 1.5 lakh were found. The agency has registered a case of cheating against the arrested.
Railway officials, however, claimed that chances of a question paper leak are minimal. Divisional railway manager
A K Agarwal said so far, there have been no complaints of a paper leak and maintained that there were no lapses on the part of the railways.
“We have various checks and balances in place.... There are three sets of question papers that are sent to the exam centres a day before, under the watch of the Railway Protection Force,” he said. He added that the question papers are opened at the examination centres in front of the students, who also sign as witnesses that the packet was sealed. Candidates sitting next to each other don’t get the same question papers.
The CBI has not contacted the SWR yet, Agarwal said. “We are not sure who the accused are. The names of some people, including Shivanna, a divisional personnel officer, and Mahesh, a work study inspector, are doing the rounds. We are waiting for the CBI to release the names of the accused.”
The exams to the post of about 800 assistant loco pilots were held in 56 centres across the city, starting last Sunday. A total of 28,000 candidates were to appear for the exams in Bangalore alone, although only about 8,400 turned up.
“This seems to be a private scam where candidates pay `5 lakh for the question paper. If they fail, the money is returned after a small cut. The question papers that were found after the raids were samples and we do not even know if it matches the question paper used in today’s exam,” Agarwal said.
The Railways has promised to provide the question papers used in the exams by Monday to the CBI after the SWR chairman meets the CBI SP, Agarwal added.