Bhiwandi Police have arrested two absconding suspects in the Maharashtra Teacher Eligibility Test (TET) question paper leak case from Beed and Bihar.
With the arrest of Prakash Misal and Ashok Sav, all 18 accused named in the chargesheet have been arrested, an officer said on Sunday.
The investigation, led by Thane City Police and Bhiwandi Division (Zone II) officers, has exposed an extensive, multi-state examination fraud network stretching across Maharashtra, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, and Delhi.
"The two suspects- Sav and Misal- were tracked down through technical intelligence, financial transaction trails, and location logs monitored by the police SIT," the officer said.
The racket unravelled a day before the examination scheduled on June 28 after Deputy Commissioner of Police (Zone II) Pavan Bansod received a tip-off about three men attempting to sell exam papers to a Bhiwandi resident.
Police had laid a trap using decoy personnel in the Kongaon area, detained the suspects, and seized four sets of question papers. Subsequent verification with Maharashtra State Council of Examination (MSCE) officials confirmed that the seized material matched the actual question paper.
According to a chargesheet filed by the Thane Police, question papers were smuggled out of an Agra printing press hidden inside shoe insoles by two employees for a mere Rs 8,000.
The chargesheet, submitted before a local court in Bhiwandi on Friday, names 18 accused, including alleged mastermind Bijendra Gupta, who was previously implicated in an Odisha paper leak.
The accused have been charged under relevant provisions of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) related to cheating, criminal breach of trust, and criminal conspiracy, along with Maharashtra state laws on examination malpractices and unfair means.
(With inputs from PTI)