CID arrests eight in PU paper leak case; financially insecure clerk aided perpetrators.
The perpetrators of the PU-II exam paper leak sneaked out the papers right under the noses of police personnel present there to maintain a “tight vigil” at the sub treasury in Kadur in Chikmagalur district. This is what came to light on Monday even as the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) sleuths cracked the case by arresting eight persons, including Munavar Basha, 44, whose brainchild it was to steal the question papers to make big money overnight.
If Basha was the brain behind the scam, it was a second division clerk at the sub treasury in Kadur, named Suneel Kumar, who was the weak link in the security apparatus. Taking advantage of Kumar’s financial problems, Basha baited him with a bribe of `1.5 lakh – and Kumar played his part well to make good the amount.
The exam paper leak happened after 6.30pm on March 14 – just a day before the PU-II exams were scheduled to begin. On that evening, Kumar (after taking the bribe) told his colleagues that he would stay back in the office as he had to attend to some “special work”. What worked in Kumar’s favour was the trust bestowed upon him by the Kadur sub treasury in-charge officer, Chandrashekhar, who had handed him the keys of an almirah in which were kept the keys to the strongroom housing the PU-II exam papers.
Once all his colleagues had left, Kumar let Basha in and opened the strongroom to allow the latter to pick up the Biology examination paper.
Sources in the CID police told DNA that Kumar used to lock the strong room after letting Basha in and keep a watch for police personnel. Inside the room, Basha opened the seal and picked one copy of the question paper which he smuggled outside, photocopied it, returned to the strongroom to keep it back in the bundle before sealing it again.
The photocopied paper was then handwritten by Basha, and several handwritten copies were then delivered to a person named Kalappa, a native of Malur (still absconding), to be neatly typed for making copies, but without the codes to avoid any detection if intercepted by the security personnel.The typed matter was then scanned and saved to send the copies to distributors for sale to students. Each leaked paper was sold for `40,000. The CID sleuths, while tracking the route that the leaked exam papers took, arrested T Sonnappa, a 37-year-old assistant teacher at Government Primary School in Dodda Kurubarahalli in Devanahalli taluk, and interrogated him. Sonnappa revealed that Basha called him as he (Sonnappa) had a network of distributors to take the leaked papers to different districts.
He had bought the Biology paper from Basha for `2 lakh. These papers were brought to Bangalore.
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