Police custody for two in JEE scam

KOLKATA: A metropolitan court here on Wednesday remanded two persons to police custody till July 31 in connection with a case regarding certain persons fraudulently appearing as candidates in the Joint Entrance (Medical) examination.

Acting Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate S Sarkar remanded Smita Chatterjee, the wife of a marine engineer, to police custody on the basis of a prayer from police for better investigation of the case.

Chatterjee, arrested from her residence in Durgapur on Sunday, had earlier been remanded to judicial custody by the magistrate.

Babli Kazmi, the other person remanded to judicial custody, hails from Uttar Pradesh. He was arrested for allegedly appearing in the examination on behalf of a candidate.

Seven persons, including undergraduate medical students Ranvijay Pathak and Ayan Banerjee, postgraduate radiology student Mihir Kumar Jha and SAIL employee Tarakeshwar Singh, were arrested on Saturday for impersonating candidates in the test.

On the basis of their statement, police arrested Chatterjee, who ran the Anandam institute that conducted distant education for the Acharya Institute in Bangalore and Vinay Mission University in Tamil Nadu.

The hired scholars impersonated candidates who allegedly paid Rs six lakh to Rs 10 lakh if they passed the test.

The modus operandi was to selected persons from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh to appear in the examination. The photographs in admit cards were switched to avoid detection of the fake candidates.