Vyapam scam: CBI chargesheet names 592 in 2012 PMT test case

New Delhi: The CBI on Thursday filed a chargesheet against 592 persons in the multi-crore Vyapam examination scam linked with 2012 Pre Medical Test (PMT) case.

Of the total persons named in the chargesheet filed in Bhopal court, 245 are new names while remaining 347 are those who have already been named as accused in the CBI's October 31 Vyapam chargesheet which carries probe related to the 2013 PMT case.

Those named in the Central Bureau of Investigation chargesheet include four Vyapam officials, chairman of four medical colleges, 11 middlemen, 46 invigilators of examination centres and 17 guardians of beneficiary candidates.

The chargesheet lists former Medical Education Director (Madhya Pradesh) S.C. Tiwari and ex-Joint Director Medical Education M.N. Srivastava as the prominent persons.

Four former Vyapam officials are former Director Pankaj Trivedi, former Senior System Analyst Nitin Mohindra, former Deputy System analyst Ajay Kumar Sen and Programmer C. K Mishra.

The scam in Vyavsayik Pariksha Mandal (Vyapam) or Madhya Pradesh Professional Examination Board broke out in 2013, wherein candidates bribed officials and rigged exams by deploying imposters to write their answersheets. The scam began in 1995 involving politicians, senior officials and businessmen.

The CBI took over investigation following the Supreme Court order on July 9, 2015.

The charge sheet was connected to the Pre-Medical Test of 2012 -- one of several cases of irregularities in examinations conducted by Vyapam.

CBI investigators said the organised rackets employed students from across the country to allegedly impersonate medical students and appear in recruitment exams since 2008. Middlemen manipulated seating arrangements and forged answersheets in exchange of lakhs of rupees.

The arrest of 20 people in Indore blew the lid off the massive scam, which quickly snowballed into the biggest political crisis for Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan and led to more than 2,000 arrests, including those of politicians, bureaucrats, and middlemen.

Over 40 persons, including witnesses, accused, and alleged beneficiaries, died in mysterious circumstances ever since the scam broke out. These included a son of the then Governor Ram Naresh Yadav. Some died in freak accidents or of mysterious illnesses.

Opposition Congress has repeatedly blamed the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for the deaths, which it alleged is a cover-up for the racket. Chouhan and the BJP deny the charge.

The charge sheet said the racketeers managed to get roll numbers in such a manner that a beneficiary candidate was seated right behind his solver candidate to facilitate cheating.

CBI investigations revealed that these solver candidates were among medical college students or bright medical college aspirants taking coaching in Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Delhi, Rajasthan, and Maharashtra.

"The CBI collected pertinent details of students of various medical colleges and coaching institutes spread all over these states and prepared a data base of more than 10 lakh such students," the chargesheet said.

IANS