IGNOU staffer among five arrested for paper leak

NEW DELHI: A breakthrough has been made by Crime Branch in the leak of question papers of Indira Gandhi National Open University (Ignou) reported in December 2018. Five people, including an Ignou employee, have been arrested in countrywide raids. The gang had leaked papers of courses like MCA and BCA and sold them to applicants.
The arrested Ignou staffer, Dev Shankar (31), works at the university’s study centre in Bokaro Steel City.Vivek was arrested from Bengaluru, Ankit from Sambhal in UP, Iqbal from Govindpuri in Delhi and Johnson from Gurugram. The mobile phones used in transmitting images of the leaked papers have been seized.
Additional commissioner (crime) Ajit Singla said the Ignou registrar had complained to police in December about the leak. He had received emails from two IDs — royalrocky**@gmail.com and hk62632**@gmail.com — in which the senders had claimed that the papers had been leaked. An FIR was registered at Neb Sarai police station, but the case was later handed over to Crime Branch.
DCP (crime) Bhisham Singh said that a team led by ACP RK Ojha and inspector Richhpal Singh mounted technical and human surveillance and questioned over 500 suspects across the country to identify the accused. The university employee turned out to be the key player and he led police to the others.
“Shankar was working as an assistant at Ignou for 13 years and the keys of the study centre would remain with him. The question papers were sent by the headquarters to the study centers via speed post. The papers were opened and sorted on the basis of exam dates and kept in an almirah in the supervisor’s office,” DCP Singh said.
The accused employee would open the envelopes, click photographs and stick the envelope back without breaking the seal. The applicants were charged Rs 1,500 for every question paper. He would take the money in his bank account or in cash. Shankar said he resorted to the crime as he earned a meager Rs 3,500, police said.