E-Paper
NEET paper leak: Hazaribagh school principal, mastermind stole papers, MBBS students solved them, reveals CBI
In a statement, the agency said the mastermind acted in connivance with Oasis School's Principal Ehsanul Haque, who was also the NTA City Coordinator.
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Thursday made startling revelations about the conspiracy behind the NEET-UG paper leak case. The agency said the alleged mastermind, Pankaj Kumar, and the principal and the vice principal of the Oasis School in Jharkhand's Hazaribagh conspired to steal the medical entrance exam's question papers, get them solved and send them to their customers hours before the test on May 5.
In a statement, the agency said Kumar acted in connivance with Oasis School's Principal Ehsanul Haque, who was also the NTA City Coordinator. Vice Principal Imtiaz Alam, who was the Centre Superintendent, also became a part of the conspiracy, the agency said.
A CBI spokesperson said a trunk with NEET question papers was brought to the school. Minutes later, the school officials allowed Pankaj Kumar access to the strongroom. They broke open the trunks using sophisticated tools.
"The trunks containing the NEET UG 2024 question papers were brought to the school and kept in the control room on the morning of 05-05-2024. Minutes after the trunks arrived, the above-said Principal and Vice Principal unauthorisedly and illegally allowed access to the room where the trunks were kept, to the mastermind named above. The sophisticated tools used to open the trunk and access the question papers from the trunk have been seized," a CBI spokesperson said.
The recovered pieces of half-burnt question papers enabled CBI to reach the designated NEET examination centre from where it was leaked, the agency added.
The paper was solved in Hazaribagh on the morning of the examination by a set of solvers who are students of MBBS courses at AIIMS Patna, RIMS Ranchi and a Medical College in Bharatpur. The agency has arrested seven alleged solvers.
"The solved paper was shared with certain selected students who paid money to the accused. All the solvers, who are MBBS students from reputed colleges, have been identified and most of them were arrested. These solvers were specially brought to Hazaribagh as part of the conspiracy," the CBI spokesperson said.
The agency said several sets of people helped the main conspirators as they arranged accommodation for the candidates and ferried them. The agency is in the process of identifying the candidates who were given access to the solved question papers.
So far, 36 people have been arrested.
The Supreme Court on Tuesday refused to cancel the entire examination and order a re-test, saying there was no evidence on record to conclude the exam was "vitiated" on account of a "systemic breach" of its sanctity.
The court, referring to CBI's status report, said 155 students who took the exam in Hazaribagh and Patna benefitted from the fraud.
With inputs from PTI
