HP high court orders CBI probe into patwari exam

The high court of Himachal Pradesh on Wednesday ordered the central bureau of investigation (CBI) to probe alleged irregularities in patwari recruitment exam conducted

The high court of Himachal Pradesh on Wednesday ordered the central bureau of investigation (CBI) to probe alleged irregularities in patwari recruitment exam conducted by state revenue department on November 17.

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Passing the order on a write petition filed by Pankaj Sharma and others, the division bench comprising justice Tarlok Singh Chauhan and justice Chander Bhushan Barowalia, gave the CBI three months to complete the probe. The petitioner had alleged that 45 of the 100 questions in the exam were taken from junior teacher eligibility test (TET) exam of junior basic teacher (JBT).

In the affidavit filed on Wednesday, the director of land records admitted that 43 of the 100 questions in the patwari exam were the same as that of TET (JBT) examination.

“This cannot be a mere coincidence, more particularly, when admittedly there are probably thousands or lakhs of questions available in the question bank,” observed the court. “Therefore, prima facie we are of the considered view that there has been some mischief in setting up of the paper for patwari examination and the intent behind the same could possibly be to help certain candidate(s),” the court said.

“However, this court has no material to draw a conclusion, therefore, it would be necessary to have the entire fact situation investigated by the CBI,” said court said, adding that CBI must submit its report to the court before the next date of hearing on April 8.