Assam Police have arrested the owner of a Guwahati-based coaching centre in connection with the case of a Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) Mains candidate using a proxy to appear for the test held in September this year.
Bhargav Deka, the owner of Global Edulite, who was on the run since a police case was lodged last month, was arrested at the Lokpriya Gopinath Bordoloi Airport after he arrived on a flight from Delhi on Sunday evening.
The 40-year-old is accused of providing a substitute candidate for Neel Nakshatra Das, who scored 99.8 percentile in the examination which selects candidates for premier engineering institutes in India, including Indian Institute of Technology (IITs).
With Deka’s arrest, the total number of arrests in the case has gone up to seven. Police have already arrested the candidate, Das, his father Dr. Jyotirmoy Das, a doctor with a prominent hospital in Guwahati, and three employees of Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), which was entrusted with conducting the test.
A woman employee of Deka coaching centre has also been arrested.
The case came to light after one Mitradev Sharma lodged an FIR on October 23 at the Azara police station, accusing Das of using unfair means in the JEE (Mains) test held on September 5.
The allegations were based on a leaked phone call in which the candidate was allegedly heard telling someone that he had not appeared in the test and someone else had written the paper on his behalf.
Preliminary investigation has revealed that Das had left the exam centre located at Borjhar after completing his biometric identification with the help of the invigilator. A proxy candidate, allegedly arranged by Deka, appeared the test on Das’s behalf.
The FIR alleged that Das’s father had paid nearly Rs 15-20 lakh to other accused in the case. Investigation has also revealed that Das was interested in pursuing humanities, but his parents, both doctors, wanted him to become an engineer and hence paid money get a proxy candidate to appear for the test.
Police are yet to trace the proxy candidate. The exact details of how he was able to appear for the test are expected to be revealed after Deka’s questioning and the arrest of the proxy.
