Published Aug 22, 2023 | 12:59 PM ⚊ Updated Aug 22, 2023 | 1:00 PM
VSSC building. (Official Website)
The Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre (VSSC) at Thiruvananthapuram has cancelled the exam conducted for recruiting technical staff following allegations of impersonation and cheating.
The police have so far arrested five people for alleged exam-related malpractice. All the accused were from Haryana.
The lead centre for the development of ISRO’s launch vehicles said in a notification that the written test for the posts of technician-B, draughtsman-B and radiographer-A that was held at various centres on Sunday, 20 August, in Thiruvananthapuram stands cancelled.
“The revised schedule for the test will be informed to all the candidates concerned, through the VSSC website in due course. Inconvenience caused is regretted,” the notification said.
On Tuesday, 22 August, three more people from Haryana were arrested in connection with the alleged impersonation and cheating during the test.
The police identified the arrested trio as Sonu, Jagdeep and Amit, all from the Jind district. Two persons — Sunil and Sumit Kumar — were arrested in the same case on Sunday. The trio were being questioned on Tuesday, 22 August.
The latest arrest of the three, out of the five from Haryana, was formally recorded late last night at the Medical College police station in Thiruvananthapuram.
An officer of the Medical College police station said the two were also part of the conspiracy to impersonate candidates and cheat in the test.
“They are all part of the same team, the same conspiracy. They all came here together,” he said.
Meanwhile, the other two, who were arrested on Sunday after being caught red-handed while impersonating candidates and cheating in the test, have been remanded in judicial custody, police said.
A case under Sections 406 (criminal breach of trust), 420 (cheating) and various other provisions of the IPC and the Information Technology Act have been lodged against those arrested, police have said.
Since 469 candidates from a single state— Haryana— had taken the test, there were suspicions over the involvement of coaching centres. An investigating team would go to Haryana to collaborate with their counterparts there, the police said earlier.
Earlier on Monday, 21 August, DCP (Law and Order) Ajith V told a television news channel that the four persons in custody were being questioned to find out whether they were part of the racket, which may also involve some coaching centres in the northern state.
The two arrested accused had come by flight from Haryana to Kerala for the test, he said.
As 469 candidates had applied for the test from Haryana and most of them turned up for it— and have probably returned home— a team would be sent to that state in connection with the investigation, Ajith said.
“We will get in touch with Haryana’s senior police police and the investigating team will go there as part of the probe,” he said.
He said that as a large number of candidates had come from one particular place to Kerala for a test, and some manipulations were carried out, police would have to ascertain whether any coaching centres were also involved in the “racket”.
Regarding the technique used by the two, the officer said button cameras were used to scan the questions that were sent to someone elsewhere using the mobile phones.
Thereafter, the answers were received by the two through small listening devices hidden in their ears, he said. Mobile phones were attached to their stomachs using belts and they allegedly used Bluetooth technology to commit the fraud.
“All this equipment will be sent for forensic examination. We have also taken their call records. They came by flight to take the test,” he further said.
Giving details of how the police came to know about the cheating, the senior IPS officer said that on Sunday— the day of the test — the police received anonymous calls at the Special Branch office and the Museum police station informing them that some manipulation would happen during the exam as some candidates have taken mobile phones into the exam centres.
“The information was passed on to the invigilators and, on verifying the same, they caught two persons—from two centres—red-handed,” the officer said.
He said that when the names and addresses of the two were checked, it was found they were different from the candidates who had actually applied.
“So, it is also a case of impersonation,” Ajith said.
“Therefore, a full-fledged investigation has been launched,” the DCP said.
The officer, meanwhile, did not blame the VSSC for the alleged loopholes in their system that led to the cheating.
Ajith said that while national recruiting agencies were more experienced at holding tests when such individual agencies (like VSSC) do it, “there can be problems”.
“I do not intend to blame anyone. I just hope they will rectify the problems and that in future they will adopt the protocols used by the more experienced agencies,” he said.
The national-level recruitment test was held only in Kerala at 10 exam centres, the police added.
(With PTI inputs)
