Under the supervision of the Central Selection Board of Constable, Bihar (CSBC) examination of police constable recruitment took place between 15-22nd October 2017 for selection of total 9,900 candidates. It had two levels of evaluation- first, the written and the last was Physical Evaluation Test (PET). On June 11, 2018, the list of the 9,900 recruited constables was released; among these were 6,643 women and 3,196 were men. In different pockets of Bihar, there are numerous cases of “Fake Candidates” appearing instead of original candidates in PET started popping up simultaneously in different parts of the state. For example here are some reported cases from different districts of the state-
According to letter number 922 of Central Selection Board (CSB) dated 22nd June 2018, 96 selected candidates from the written examination of CSB reached Jamui, Bihar Military Police (BMP) 11 to appear for Physical Entrance Test (PET) out of which 37 were male candidates and 59 candidates were female.
Eyeing the eligibility of candidates, when the Commandant compared the height, and tried to match the face of candidates with that on the certificate, he found suspicious results when there was difference between the given standards of height and height of candidates, faces of many candidates did not match with that on the certificate. For General and SC & ST candidates, the mandatory requirement of height was 165 centimeters and 155 centimeters respectively but the candidates appeared had 164 centimeters and 151 centimeters. Many insiders of BMP 11 on condition of keeping their identity secret claimed that in the recruitment process, influential names of the state had a big role to play in it. If any investigation takes place, a big fraud will be caught. Seeing strict attitude of the commandant, candidates namely- Amit, Kaushal and Subodh ran away right from the examination center. The BMP commandant, Safi-ul-Haq’s deep concern on these irregularities was a clue indicating a big forgery in the selection of Bihar Police Constables.
In Bettiah, candidate Nitish Kumar (Roll no.- 7713120695) was arrested in case of carrying out an illegal joining as constable. According to SI, Upendra Kumar, instead of Nitish, another candidate had appeared for the written examination and also appeared for PET. But during the joining process, his height, chest and face did not even match with that of the details provided during previous exams. An FIR was registered against this fraud attempt.
In Jamalpur Police station of Munger district, an FIR was registered against Nandan Kumar. He was caught on basis on sending a fraud candidate in PET and the documents with which he arrived at BMP-9 located at Jamalpur, his documents were found to be suspicious, thus he was arrested.
In Bhagalpur district, a candidate named Sulekha was arrested carrying out the same fraud. Again there was mismatch in height, measurement and face. After getting arrested, she confessed that during PET, she hired a fake candidate bribing her Rs 10,000/-
According to Rohtas district SHO Dharmendra Kumar, Mithilesh Kumar, a resident of Bhagalpur district, was recruited as a constable. When Mithilesh Kumar came to Rohtas to join the police, his height and chest width mismached with the measurements given in the documents. Even his signature did not match. An examination of the recruitment papers revealed that someone else had appeared for his physical examination. He was arrested and sent to jail.
In Chhapra, 56 candidates appeared came to join as constable out of which 3 were found suspicious and were arrested. On discrepancies in signature and face match arrests were made.
In Saharsa, with help of fake candidates, three male and one female candidate cleared the written exam and later got appeared for PET in which they were caught by the Saharsa Police when their signature and photos did not match from original details.
In Sheohar district, a candidate named Rajneesh Kumar took Rs 2.5 lakh to appear for one Roshan Kumar to take the PET. According to Sheohar superintendent of police Santosh Kumar, Rajneesh assured Roshan that he would be selected, but before he could join, the discrepancies in his height, chest width and signature were found and was caught.
6 candidates named Sujeet Kumar from Jehanabad, Premchand from Rohtas, Pappu Kumar Ram from Supaul, Mukesh Kumar from Munger, Krishna Kumar from Munger and Bambam Kumar from Munger were caught during physical examination at the Gardanibagh stadium, Patna. They were all caught when their thumb impressions did not match. The students were handed over to the police at the Gardanibagh police station by the officers present at the PET center. They have all passed the written examination by having scholars appear for them. When they appeared for the PET, though, their thumb impressions failed to match with those taken during the written exams.
Similarly, Dhirendra Kumar in Lakhisarai, Deepak in Begusarai, Rajveer, Prem Sagar Mona and Neeraj Kumar in Muzaffarpur were arrested for carrying out the discrepancies of same nature. Here is the copy of FIR against fraud done by Rajveer, Prem Sagar Mona and Neeraj Kumar in which police clearly mentions about discrepancies on height and face of fake candidates with those mentioned in data provided by CSBC officials.
GOVERNMENT’S BLIND EYE:
On contrary to these shocking events of organized fraud in different pockets of Bihar, at least 300 students had hit the streets with constant protests at the Daank Bangla Chauraha and Hartali More for seven consecutive days but neither the state government and nor the media gave heed to these legitimate demands of the students. This administrative assault did not stop here. Even the original candidates were arrested by Bihar police instead of those who entered the system through back door. The sequence of incidents of fraud candidates cannot be a coincidence.
Rajiv Mishra, an SSP Gaya, publicly acknowledged the rampant travesty.
The Patna high court sought a reply from the Central Selection Board. Intentions of Bihar government is also under scanner as the number of defaulting candidates caught during the PET – 1,800 as of now – spells a bigger concern but it has fallen on deaf ears. The number of defaulters in the written exam is expected to be so high that it is not even being investigated.
It is allegedly put that state’s DGP K.S.Dwivedi has played a big role in this fraud appointment and selection. One should notice that PET was in action before he assumed office as DGP. He became DGP on 27th February 2018 and just after this elevation, the rejected candidates from the previous PET results whose thumb imprint did not match, were allowed to undergo PET despite established irregularities. Even the victim students who had filed a case in Patna high against this forgery, approached Deputy Chief Minister but their request was disregarded within no time. We should pose the follow questions to Bihar government-
- Should we really think that the 300 petitioners (candidates) against this fraud are liars?
- If this isn’t an organized racket of state sponsored fraud, how the same incident were reported in different pockets of Bihar?
- Why did the words of Rajiv Mishra, IPS Gaya were not taken seriously by the government when he alleged rampant fraud in PET?
- Why did the state government did not question the non-transparent selection process of Central Selection Board of Constables (CSBC) after repeated incidents of forgery, statewide?
The whole planning of fraud recruitment definitely has to do something with those sitting in power. Nepotism of highest order, hidden political influence and large influx of money power has practically diminished hopes of youth in a state where the migration of youth population is among the highest. Aspirations of many innocent, hardworking individuals have been deliberately pushed in dark, by the administrative system of Bihar, making us a slave of political babus. It must also be noted that, the opposition parties in Bihar have not taken the issue seriously as this never surfaced in public domain. Even big media houses felt to ignore the issue as probably it was not suitable to the ruling parties, JDU-BJP both in Bihar and at the Center. Our conclusion should be, Nitish Kumar’s stand on corruption is aptly questionable and deserves a tough scrutiny at every level such as- social, political and legal.
