BERHAMPUR: Berhampur police on Monday claimed to have busted a racket dealing with fake certificates with the arrest of four persons including a government school teacher and his son. The arrested persons are Daitari Behera (52), a teacher in Debijhar Government High School in Khallikote, and his son Amrut Prasad Behera (25) of Langaleswar village in Ganjam, Prashant Sahoo (39) of Mangalpur in Dhenkanal and Kishore Behera (52)of Ranihat in Cuttack.
Addressing media persons, Berhampur SP Saravana Vivek M said the four accused were arrested based on the complaint of one Manoranjan Gauda. On April 21, Manoranjan lodged a complaint with Gosaninuagaon police alleging that his wife Aparajita joined the BEd course in Acharya Nagarjuna University at Guntur in Andhra Pradesh in 2016 with the help of Daitari. She completed her BEd course in 2019.
When Manoranjan asked Daitari to provide the certificate, the latter initially tried to avoid him. After much persuasion, the accused teacher finally provided him with his wife’s mark sheets and provisional certificate and took over `3 lakh in the form of cheques.
However, Manoranjan became suspicious and went to Acharya Nagarjuna University in June 2022 to verify the certificates. To his shock, he found that the certificates were fake. The SP said Daitari’s son Amrut was arrested for conspiring with his father and supporting him in his illegal activities. Prashant, who runs a printing shop in Dhenkanal, prepared and supplied the fake certificates to Daitari. Many fake seals of doctors and college principals were seized from him.
Similarly, Kishore supplied the papers used in making the fake certificates to Prashant. Earlier, Kishore was arrested by Jeypore police in a case related to fake certificates and is currently out on bail. Vivek said many blank certificates of the Board of Secondary Education and Council of Higher Secondary Education were recovered from the duo’s possession. The four accused were produced in court and further investigation is underway.