The police said, "Out of the nine arrested, one is a teacher, three are candidates and five are government employees."
Karnataka Police on Tuesday claimed to have arrested nine people for their involvement in KPTCL paper leak. (Representational Image/Creative Commons)
Nine persons have been arrested for allegedly leaking question papers of the recruitment examination held to fill the posts of junior assistants in the Karnataka Power Transmission Corporation Limited (KPTCL), Karnataka Police said on Tuesday, 23 August.
According to the police, the nine arrested are from Belagavi and Gadag districts. The competitive exam for 959 posts of junior assistants of KPTCL took place on 7 August.
The arrested have been identified as Siddappa Madihalli, Sunil, Amresh, Maruti Sonavane, Samith Kumar, Prakash, Basavanna, Siddappa Kenchappa and Renuka.
“Out of the nine arrested, one is a teacher, three are candidates and five are government employees,” police said.
Belagavi Superintendent of Police (SP), Dr Sanjeev Patil told South First, “Over the last two weeks, we have arrested nine persons for their roles in leaking the question paper of the KPTCL exam.”
Among those arrested are the vice-principal of Municipal College in Gadag-Betageri Maruti Sonavane and his son Samith Kumar.
A senior police officer deployed at the Gokak police station said, “The first arrest was of an examinee named Siddappa Madihalli and based on his inputs during questioning, the rest of the arrests were made.”
“The kingpin of the KTPCL question paper leak belongs to Belagavi. Raids are being conducted at different locations to nab him,” added the officer.
The officer further added that the Municipal College was one of the 21 exam centres in Gadag-Betageri town.
According to the police, Samith Kumar, posing as a journalist, entered the examination centre and took snaps of the question paper on his phone and shared it on WhatsApp.
During the course of the investigation the police learnt that the examinees used bluetooth devices and smartwatches to cheat in the competitive examination.
One of the arrested told the police that a few people were stationed at a farmhouse near the examination centre to send answers to the questions to the examinees on their bluetooth devices and WhatsApp.
The officials investigating the case are also trying to establish the money trail between the examinees and the kingpin of the racket.
The Gadag district police have booked all the arrested under IPC Sections 109, 119, 201, 202, 204, 212, 409, 465, 468, and 471.
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