The Maharashtra Public Service Commission (MPSC) drug inspector exam paper leak may never have come to light had a breakup between two aspirants not happened.
The whistleblower Gaurav Patil alerted the examination authority after he was betrayed by his ex-girlfriend Hrutuja Patil.
Hrutuja, an aspirant received the question paper through her father Amrut, who is an owner of one of the private coaching centres.
Amrut approached a middleman called Pravin Patil who had connections within government examination circles. The later sold the question paper to Amrut for a whopping Rs 40 lakh.
After receiving the paper, Hrutuja shared only some of the questions with Gaurav. Later Hrutuja passed with flying colours, while Gaurav flunk the exam.
What followed was a breakup and a sense of revenge that led Gaurav to reveal digital evidences of questions sent by his ex-girlfriend with the MPSC.
The police investigated this case. They found out the truth and arrested six people, including MPSC officer bearers.
The police also got the audio clip of Hrutaja, in which she was boasting about how the paper was leaked and how she benefited due to her father's connections with 'big people' in the exam circles.
This issue comes in the wake of the NEET paper leak, which triggered mass youth-led protests and eventually Dharmendra Pradhan’s resignation as Education Minister. It also followed the JPSC controversy, where protests by aspirants forced Chief Minister Soren to cancel the examinations.
Meanwhile, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi had also raised this MPSC paper leak issue in his Chatro Ki Goonj program in Pune and asked the Maharashtra government to carry out a fair and impartial probe.
The MPSC cancelled the recruitment process for drug inspectors and announced a re-exam. Rahul Gandhi called this a student victory and asked them to raise their voices against the injustice.
The MPSC conducted the drug inspectors' post exam in six divisions of Maharashtra on March 22, 2026.
