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Bihar topper, 42, arrested for faking his age

Kumar came under the scanner, when he was untraceable for two days after the declaration of the results on Tuesday, unlike other toppers who were busy in post-result interviews.

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The Bihar School Examination Board (BSEB) has withheld the result of its Intermediate Arts (IA) 2017 "topper" 42-year-old Ganesh Kumar, who was arrested late on Friday evening for falsely mentioning his age as 24 in the admission and exam registration forms. According to sources, Kumar also has two children, who study in primary school.

Kumar came under the scanner, when he was untraceable for two days after the declaration of the results on Tuesday, unlike other toppers who were busy in post-result interviews. When he finally surfaced at his RNSJN Higher Secondary School in Samastipur on Thursday, he failed to answer basic questions related to "sur, taal and raag" satisfactorily, despite scoring 65/70 in music practicals.

Addressing a press meet in Patna, BSEB Chairman Anand Kishor said, "We have ordered lodging of an FIR against Ganesh Kumar for furnishing wrong details related to his age. He has been given three days to reply why his results should not be cancelled, and till then his name will remain scrapped from the list of toppers."

Kishor said, "The copies of all toppers were rechecked by a group of experts. We again got Ganesh Kumar's copies checked by experts, and no discrepancy has been found in it. There has been no mistake by the Board. The toppers are knowledgable in their respective subjects."

However, a background check of Ganesh by the BSEB officials has revealed startling facts, Kishor said and added, "Ganesh is around 42 years old and had passed his Matriculation exam from a Giridih school in 1990.

However, to reduce his age, he registered for BSEB's Matriculation exam in 2015 from Samastipur, where he mentioned his date of birth as June 2, 1993 (24 years) and after passing Class X, he appeared for the Intermediate exams this year."

An FIR will also be lodged against Samastipur school administrations, from where Ganesh appeared for BSEB's Class 10 and Classs 12 exams. His 2015 Matriculation results have also been withheld.

However, while replying to media persons' queries before being detained, Kumar denied reducing his age and defensively said, "I have done no fraud. Is studying a fraud? The way you are doing, how will a poor person study?" But, Kumar had no answers when asked his date of birth or from where he had passed his exam in 1990.

The episode is a reminder of 2016, when the results of Intermediate arts and commerce "toppers" Ruby Rai and Saurabh Kumar, were cancelled by the Board after they were found undeserving of the top slot by a group of experts. It has left the state government red faced, especially since Bihar education minister and ruling JD (U) spokespersons were defending Ganesh, since he surfaced before the media on Thursday.

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