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Teacher recruitment corruption case: Man arrested; anticipatory bail of 27 others rejected
One person was arrested by Pune police while the anticipatory bail of 27 others was rejected by a court in Pune on Friday in a case of teacher recruitment-related corruption case
One person was arrested by Pune police while the anticipatory bail of 27 others was rejected by a court in Pune on Friday in a case of teacher recruitment-related corruption case.
Among those accused are union leader Sambhaji Shirsath who was arrested last week in another case related to recruitment corruption; Ramchandra Jadhav; Meenakshi Raut, both officials of Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC); Mushtaq Shaikh, Dattatray Shendkar, both official of Zilla Parishad (ZP); and Jyotsna Shinde, an official of Pimpri Chinchwad Municipal Corporation (PCMC) along with 22 others.
“One person has been arrested and we are looking to arrest all others named in the case,” said ACP Shivaji Pawar who had conducted raids in a case in six places one week ago and in eight places in 2020.
The arrested man was identified as Govind Dabhade, (65), who is the head of Navnagar Education Trust, Akurdi. His son, Parimal Dabhade, is yet to be arrested.
The accused had collectively filed 11 anticipatory bail applications in the court of additional sessions judge S Navandar who heard arguments in all the applications and rejected them.
The booked people have been accused of being part of a system where fake students were made up to create teacher positions and allegedly forging documents of teachers, who are required to finish a tenure as unaided teachers before being recruited as government teachers, to show their fake tenure, according to the police.
“In one case, the documents of the teacher shows that she started teaching as an unaided teacher in the year 2010 when she was actually in class nine as per her school documents,” said an official close to the investigation.
The recruitment, according to the FIR in the matter dates back to 2012 and involved multiple education trusts and education department officials at various levels. Kisan Dattoba Bhujbal, 50, an official at the Zilla Parishad (ZP) primary education department.
“These are teachers who have cheated the entire system for a long time. Shirsath was arrested in another similar case registered at Samarth police station and later granted bail. Forged stamps were found in the house of his sister during the last raid,” said advocate Pravin Chavan who has been appointed as the special public prosecutor in the case.
A case under Indian Penal Code (IPC) sections 120(b) criminal conspiracy, 420 (cheating), 409, 465 (forgery), 467, 471, 109, 186, 201, and 34, along with sections 13(1)(a)(b) and 13(2) of Prevention of Corruption Act, 1989 was initially registered against 28 people at Bund garden police station. Three more accused were added to the list of accused later.
