CBI submits charge-sheet against 16 in Odisha police sub inspector recruitment case

Of the 16 accused, nine were arrested by the Odisha Crime Branch during the initial phase of the investigation

The Central Bureau of Investigation on Monday filed a comprehensive charge-sheet against 16 persons, including alleged mastermind Shankar Prusty, in the Odisha police sub-inspector recruitment examination scandal.

Of the 16 accused, nine were arrested by the Odisha Crime Branch during the initial phase of the investigation. The remaining seven were arrested by the CBI after it took over the probe.

The preliminary charge-sheet, submitted before a designated CBI court in Bhubaneswar, contains documentary and material evidence against the accused, who are alleged to have engaged in systematic malpractices to manipulate the examination results, officials familiar with the development said.

Among those named in the chargesheet are Shankar Prusty, Muna Mohanty, Suresh Nayak, Soumya Priyadarshini Samal, Rinku Maharana, Biranchi Nayak and Nitish Kumar, apart from other accused whose roles remain under scrutiny by the investigating agency.

Of the 16 accused, nine were arrested by the Odisha Crime Branch during the initial phase of the investigation. The remaining seven were arrested by the CBI after it took over the probe. Seven were produced before the court following custodial interrogation, an official, aware of the developments, said.

The investigation has revealed that Prusty, a resident of Hinjili, maintained connections with senior officials, politicians and police officers. He is suspected of having used his companies Panchsoft Tech Private Limited and Kedarnath Technologies, to manipulate the examination process, according to the charge-sheet.

The SI recruitment examination scheduled to be held in October 1st week by the Odisha Police Recruitment Board (OPRB) was cancelled after the leak was discovered. The board had outsourced the work to ITI Limited, a government-owned telecommunications company based in Kolkata which subsequently contracted Silicon Techlab Private Limited in Bhubaneswar, which further subcontracted to Panchsoft Technologies Private Limited, a Bhubaneswar-based IT company.

The syndicate headed by Mohanty and Prusty worked in tandem to leak the question papers from the day the it was prepared. Mohanty's agents collected original certificates and blank cheques from aspirants in exchange for leaked question papers.

Each deal allegedly cost candidates between ₹20 lakh and ₹25 lakh while Prusty ran multiple fake online test centres in Bhubaneswar, Raghunathpur, Berhampur, Balasore, Puri, Gajapati, Cuttack, and Bhawanipatna that were reportedly used to facilitate pre-exam manipulation and monitor candidates.

The SI recruitment exam scam was done in 2 modules- Vizianagaram in Andhra Pradesh and Digha in West Bengal, while the entire syndicate was being monitored by Prusty from Delhi. Mohanty was in-charge of the Vizianagaram module, while Arvind Das was heading the Digha module in West Bengal.