Bhubaneswar: In a new development in police Sub-Inspector (SI) recruitment exam scam, the Berhampur JMFC (Rural) Court has granted the Odisha Crime Branch five days’ remand of key accused, Shankar Prusty, and suspected middleman Arabinda Das.
While the Crime Branch had sought seven days’ remand, the court approved a five-day period to facilitate further interrogation.
As per information, Shankar Prusty, a resident of Jagannathpur in Ganjam district who is accused of being the mastermind behind the question paper leak, was arrested from the Nepal border in Uttarakhand on Saturday. He was produced before the court on Monday.
Das, a resident of Nabara village in Balasore district, was arrested on October 5 in connection with the scam. The agency suspected they might have played a key role in the scam and arrested them after getting sufficient evidence.
The Crime Branch is likely to extract vital information from the accused and trace the source of the leakage of question papers, money transactions and whether other persons are involved in the case, among others, sources said.
Prusty’s lawyer had moved a bail petition, which was rejected by the court. Both accused have been sent to Berhampur jail and will be taken on remand for further interrogation by the Crime Branch in connection with the police recruitment scam.
The Crime Branch has already conducted face-to-face interrogations of two key accused and is expected to trace the larger network involved in the racket.
The Odisha Police Recruitment Board (OPRB), according to reports, had outsourced the conduct of the Combined Police Service Examination (CPSE) 2024 to ITI Limited, a central public-sector undertaking (PSU) headquartered in Kolkata. However, ITI Limited further sub-contracted the job to Bhubaneswar-based Silicon Techlab, which in turn assigned key responsibilities to Panchsoft Technologies headed by Prusty. CEO of Silicon Techlab Suresh Nayak has also been arrested in connection with the case.
“It is learnt that he (Prusty) in collusion with Silicon Techlab was planning to engage in large-scale organised malpractices during CPSE,” the TNIE earlier reported, quoting a confidential intelligence report.
Prusty was leader of the crime syndicate and operated from the backdoor through agents, who contacted aspirants, collected original certificates and blank cheques, and promised question papers in exchange for kickbacks ranging from Rs 15 lakh to Rs 25 lakh.
He went underground when the scam came to the fore after Berhampur Police intercepted three buses near the Odisha-Andhra Pradesh border on September 30 and detained 117 people, including three agents. Subsequently, Prusty’s two main associates Munna Mohanty and Srikanta Maharana alias Rinku were arrested on October 16. And a day later, four more accused Priyadarsini Samal, T Abhimanyu Dora, Arabinda Das and Biswaranjan Behera, who were agents and part of the syndicate, were also nabbed.
Police have arrested 127 people, including 114 aspirants, in the case so far. The aspirants were released on conditional bail recently.
