VIPL feared losing lucrative business after May, say cops.
The Cyber Crime Investigation Cell (CCIC), probing the loss of data of candidates for the Maharashtra Public Service Commission (MPSC) exam, suspects that this may have been done deliberately by the IT solutions firm handling the data, with the aim of securing a renewal of the contract.
It was previously believed after an internal probe by the MPSC and the state information technology department that the act was a conspiracy planned to postpone the civil service exam, for the benefit of students of some coaching classes.
Mukund Pawar, police inspector investigating the case, said on Thursday that VAST India Pvt Ltd (VIPL), which was engaged to provide online application services to MPSC since May 2010 earned about Rs3 crore in three years and its contract was to end in May. The Andheri-based company managed the online applications as well as the online despatch of call letters for interviews.
“MPSC did not pay VIPL for its services directly, but from the money generated from each online application, Rs7 was deposited to the company’s account,” Pawar said. An estimated 40 lakh candidates had applied online for various posts, in the three-year period.
A total 3.22 lakh candidates had applied for the exam that was to be held on April 7 at 935 centres in 35 districts, for 265 vacancies for grade I and II officers. But when many candidates who did not get their hall tickets by March 28, they started to inquire with the MPSC and it was discovered that the data was missing. The exam was first put off to May 18, but subsequently was cancelled altogether.
The entire online application format was prepared by VIPL, which is owned by Vivek Chandel. “Chandel feared that once the contract was over the company would not be entitled to more money through the online applications and that the MPSC would continue to operate the system on its own,” the police inspector said.
“We suspect that in March, Chandel and his employee Virendra Asolkar uploaded a new format over the existing format and this corrupted the data. They probably expected that the MPSC would approach them to sort out the problem and that in this way the contract would get renewed,” Pawar said.
The police inspector explained that it seems less likely now that this happened to benefit some students of coaching classes. Chandel and Asolkar were arrested on July 10, on charges of criminal breach of trust and fraud.
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