CUTTACK: In a major breakthrough in the special Odisha Teacher Eligibility Test (OTET) question paper leak case, the Crime Branch of Odisha Police on Sunday arrested Nihar Ranjan Mohanty, vice president of the Board of Secondary Education (BSE), for his alleged involvement.
The BSE is responsible for conducting final examinations for various state-sponsored courses, including Class-X board exams, OTET, Odisha Secondary School Teacher Eligibility Test (OSSTET), Teachers’ Certificate (CT) examination, Certificate Course in Physical Education Examination (CPEd), and the Prathama and Madhyama examinations.
With Mohanty’s arrest, the total number of arrests in the case has risen to eight. Earlier, seven others had been arrested, including data entry operator Jitan Moharana and teacher Prasant Kumar Khamari.
Briefing the media, DGP of CID (CB) Vinaytosh Mishra said Mohanty was involved in setting the OTET question papers and was coordinating with a Bhopal-based firm hired for printing them. Before the final printing, the firm had sent a password-protected copy of the paper to Mohanty for proofreading. As per protocol, he was to download and delete the file after proofreading.
However, Mishra said Mohanty violated the protocol by allowing Moharana, who worked in the office of the Controller of Examinations but had no role in setting papers, access to his laptop.
The presence of the proofread copy on Mohanty’s laptop raised suspicions, leading to his interrogation on Saturday.
“Verification of call records revealed over 100 calls between Mohanty and Moharana over the past three months outside of office hours,” Mishra added.
Mohanty, who has been overseeing examinations for the past 11 years, was arrested based on evidence collected during the investigation. Efforts are ongoing to uncover others' involvement and trace related financial transactions.
Interestingly, data entry operator Moharana was removed from the confidential section around three months back over allegations of suspicious conduct. “However, despite such allegations against him, Mohanty involved him in the examination process. Investigation revealed, the duo shared a close link. So both have an equal role in the question paper leak,” Mishra said.
The OTET-2025 examination, which was scheduled for July 20, was cancelled after a handwritten copy of the question paper went viral on social media, affecting nearly 75,000 candidates. In response, the BSE transferred six officials, including staff from the confidential and coordination sections.
In the first round of arrests on July 30, Moharana and five others were taken into custody, followed by Khamari’s arrest on August 1. Moharana had accessed the vice president’s laptop and obtained the question paper using a pen drive. He then shared it with the working president of the State Ex-cadre Teachers’ Association and its Koraput unit head, who sold the paper to three brokers.
Khamari reportedly translated the question paper into his handwriting using a Google Translate app. Preliminary investigation suggests that Moharana received Rs 2.5 lakh through a UPI-based payment platform, according to Crime Branch sources.