CBI Registers Three More Vyapam FIRs, Seeks More Sleuths

NEW DELHI:The CBI on Friday registered three new FIRs related to the Vyapam scam in Madhya Pradesh .

The first case has been registered against two persons regarding the alleged illegalities in the police constable recruitment test in 2014 conducted by Vyapam and the second is against the two over the illegalities in the same test in 2013 and the third case against one pertains to the 2012 test.

On the directions of the Supreme Court, the CBI has taken over the investigation, which was earlier being probed by the Madhya Pradesh Special Task Force. With three new cases, the agency has so far registered 55 cases and 10 preliminary enquires (PE).

The Special Task Force, which was earlier probing the scam, had registered more than 185 cases and arrested around 2,000 people, including former state Education Minister Laxmikant Sharma and several top bureaucrats. The agency is also probing the mysterious deaths related to the scam.

Meanwhile, citing staff shortage, the CBI has sought more time from the Supreme Court to take over the cases from the Special Task Force. Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi told the Bench headed by Chief Justice of India(CJI) H L Dattu that the Vyapam cases would go up from the present 185 and all efforts were being made by the government to overcome the shortage of CBI sleuths.

“The problem that really arises is that the burden on the CBI is tremendous. The number of FIRs will rise and will not be limited to the present 185,” AG said.

On this, the Bench asked him to inform on August 24 “by what time CBI will take over the maximum (number of) cases”.

The AG said, though, the CBI has its own cadre, 50 per cent of the personnel were on deputation and now, even they were short in numbers.

“To solve this problem, we will increase the strength of the CBI through the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT),” he said, while explaining that there were certain grade of officials in the agency who alone were entrusted with investigation. The AG said a request would be made to West Bengal and Madhya Pradesh, where CBI sleuths were probing Saradha and Vyapam scams respectively, seeking 200 state cadre officials on deputation to probe the remaining cases.