Eight arrested, NEET racket busted; Rs 20 lakh charged for impersonators to write exam

NEW DELHI:  The CBI on Monday busted a NEET cheating racket that helped candidates crack the undergraduate medical entrance exam by sending impersonators to write it on their behalf.

Hours after Sunday’s exam, the CBI received information that several persons had conspired to arrange paper solvers to impersonate real candidates at various examination centres in Delhi and Haryana.

An FIR was registered. After conducting raids at multiple sites, the agency on Monday arrested eight persons, including the gang’s leader Sushil Ranjan and its team of paper solvers.

The gang promised aspiring doctors an assured undergraduate medical seat for a sum of Rs 20 lakh. “Aspirants would be asked to pay around Rs 20 lakh for getting a secure seat. Out of this, about four to five lakh would be given to the solver and rest was shared between middlemen and others,” a bureau source said.

“The user IDs and passwords of the candidates were collected by the suspects and their associates. Necessary modifications were made to get the desired examination centres,” informed a CBI officer.

“They mixed and morphed photographs to help proxy candidates gain entry to the exam halls. Forged ID cards were made using copies of the originals obtained from the candidates.”

Even a few doctors are allegedly involved with the cheating and the bureau is probing their roles.

According to sources, the paper solvers reached Delhi on Saturday and Sunday and stayed in some hotels.

Apart from Sushil Ranjan, the others arrested have been identified as Brij Mohan Singh, Pappu, Uma Shankar Gupta, Nidhi, Krishna Shankar Yogi, Sunny Ranjan, Raghunandan, Jeepu Lal, Hemendra and Bharat Singh.