New Delhi:

Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), in its chargesheet filed against Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) leader K Kavitha, has stated that she was involved in the manipulation and tweaking of the Delhi Excise Policy.

During the investigation, the role of the accused, Ms Kavitha has surfaced not only in the collection of upfront money but also in the transfer of ill-gotten money to Goa through the Hawala channel, stated CBI.

It has been revealed that her co-accused associates, viz., Abhishek Boinpally and PA Ashok Kaushik, were involved in the transfer of ill-gotten money to Goa through the Hawala channel.

It has been revealed that the accused Arvind Kumar Singh, who was posted and functioning as Production Controller-Cum-Commercial Head of India Ahead News, owned by the accused Mootha Gautham and Abhishek Boinpally, the co-accused associate of the accused K Kavitha, has acted as a conduit of the accused persons of the South Group and played a major role in transfer of ill-gotten money of Rs 7.10 crore to Goa from Delhi through Hawala Channel.

The Rouse Avenue Court on Monday took cognizance of the Supplementary chargesheet filed against BRS leader K Kavitha by the CBI in the Delhi Excise Policy case.

Special judge Kaveri Baweja, after taking cognizance of the supplementary charge sheet directed to produce Kavitha before the court through video conferencing on July 26.

The court has directed us to supply a copy of the supplementary charge sheet to the counsel for Kavitha and others.

The matter has been listed for scrutiny of documents on the next date of hearing.

The Court on July 8 reserved an order on cognizance of the charge sheet (third supplementary charge sheet in this case.)

Advocate DP Singh had submitted that cognizance of the offence has already been taken. We are aware that a policy was made and the influence of South Group was there. All key people in the group worked under Kavitha’s command.

He also read over the statements of TDP MP Magunta S Reddy, who met Delhi CM Kejriwal on March 16, 2021. His son, Raghav Magunta, also confirmed this.

He also submitted that there is a list of statements we are relying upon, including Sarath Reddy, Gopi Kumaran and Raghav Magunta. There are many people who will ultimately speak against Kavitha.

cognizance of the offence is already taken, this charge sheet is only for the limited purpose of consideration and summoning of this accused, DP Singh said.

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) filed a charge sheet against BRS leader K Kavitha in the Delhi Excise Policy case on June 6. This is the third supplementary charge sheet filed by the CBI in the Delhi Excise Policy case.

Kavitha is in judicial custody in both CBI and ED cases. She was first arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on March 15. Thereafter, she was arrested by the CBI on April 11.

On July 1, the Delhi High Court on Monday dismissed the bail petitions moved by Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) leader K Kavitha in CBI and ED cases related to the Excise Policy case.

The plea moved by Kavitha stated that she is a mother of two children, one of whom is a minor presently under shock and is undergoing medical supervision. Kavitha, in her fresh bail plea, alleges that there have been attempts to drag her into the scandal by the members of the ruling party at the Centre.

She, through bail plea, submitted that the entire case of the Enforcement Directorate hinges upon statements made by the approver, witnesses or co-accused under Section 50 of the PMLA. The Prosecution Complaints do not put forth a single document which corroborates the statements. There is not a single piece of evidence which points to the guilt of the applicant.

She further stated that the arrest of the applicant is illegal as Section 19 of the PMLA has not been complied with.

Neither has any corroboration to the allegation of the actual cash transaction nor any money trail is forthcoming, therefore, the satisfaction of guilt as expressed in his arrest order is merely a sham and a pretence, she stated.

The ED and the CBI had alleged that irregularities were committed while modifying the excise policy, undue favours were extended to licence holders, the licence fee was waived or reduced and the L-1 licence was extended without the competent authority’s approval.

The beneficiaries diverted “illegal” gains to the accused officials and made false entries in their books of account to evade detection, the probe agencies said.

As per the allegations, the Excise Department had decided to refund the earnest money deposit of about Rs 30 crore to a successful tenderer against the set rules.

Even though there was no enabling provision, a waiver on tendered licence fees was allowed from December 28, 2021, to January 27, 2022, due to COVID-19, the probe agency said and there was an alleged loss of Rs 144.36 crore to the exchequer.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

A man who stole NEET-UG paper from the trunk of the National Testing Agency in Bihar’s Hazaribagh before they were allegedly leaked and his associate has been arrested by the CBI today, sources said. Pankaj Kumar, who stole the paper, has been arrested from Patna while Raju Singh was caught in Jamshedpur.

Mr Kumar aka Aaditya did his civil engineering from NIT Jamshedpur in 2017, the sources said. His accomplice Raju had allegedly distributed the leaked paper, they said.

 Leak Had Genesis In Hazaribagh: CBI

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) had earlier zeroed in on Hazaribagh as the origin place of the NEET-UG paper leak. The paper was leaked by Oasis school in Hazari Bagh, the CBI probe said, adding, that two sets of papers which reached there had their seals broken and instead of flagging the issue the staff of the school remained tight-lipped.

“Nine sets of question papers were dispatched from SBI Hazaribagh to different centres. The ones that reached Oasis school centre had their seals broken. The staff there did not raise an alarm and thus, their role is established,” a senior official disclosed.

“Based on technical evidence, they had made searches in Learn and Play School in Patna where some burnt papers were recovered,” he explained adding that the case was later taken over by the Bihar Economic Offences Unit (EOU).

On June 21, the NTA disclosed that the code matched the papers found in Oasis school, he added.

Interestingly, the principal of the school, Dr Ehsanul Haque, was also the district coordinator for the NEET-UG exam in Hazaribagh and vice-principal Imtiaz Alam was the centre coordinator. 

The CBI, which is probing the alleged irregularities in the medical entrance exam, has registered several First Information Reports (FIRs) and made nearly 60 arrests so far. 

The NEET-UG exam – conducted by the National Testing Agency for admissions to MBBS, BDS, AYUSH and other related courses in government and private institutions – was held on May 5 this year. The exam has been mired in controversy, with allegations of cheating and impersonation. The CBI FIR from Bihar pertains to paper leaks, while those registered in Gujarat, Rajasthan and Maharashtra, are linked to the impersonation of candidates and cheating.

This year, the exam was conducted on May 5 at 4,750 centres in 571 cities, including 14 abroad. More than 23 lakh candidates had appeared for the test.

67 Students Scored Perfect 720

Sixty-seven students had scored a perfect 720 in this year’s exam, unprecedented in the NTA’s history, with six from a Haryana centre figuring in the list, raising suspicion about irregularities in the examination. It was alleged that grace marks contributed to the 67 students sharing the top rank.

The number of candidates sharing the top rank was reduced to 61 from 67 as the NTA announced the revised results on July 1 after conducting a retest for 1,563 candidates. Forty-eight per cent of students who were scheduled to retake the exam on June 24 did not turn up. Of the total, 813 (52 per cent) gave the retest and 750 skipped, the data released by the NTA showed.

The exam has also been riddled with allegations of paper leaks which are being probed by the CBI.

New Delhi:

Making a strong case for his client, senior lawyer Abhishek Manu Singhvi has said politics is writ large over Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal being arrested both by the Enforcement Directorate and the CBI in the alleged liquor policy scam and that the approach taken by the prosecution is not one that would be adopted by “prosecutors or even persecutors”.

In an exclusive interview with NDTV on Friday, Mr Singhvi also claimed that the CBI taking the AAP chief into custody soon after he was granted bail in the ED case is proof that politics was at play and went on to coin a new term for this: “insurance arrest”. 

The Congress leader’s comments came hours after the Supreme Court granted Mr Kejriwal bail in the case under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act being investigated by the ED. The chief minister will, however,  remain in jail because he is yet to get relief in the case filed by the CBI.

When it was pointed out to him that the accused have been arrested by both CBI and the ED in the past, a combative Mr Singhvi said, “You are absolutely right, but just because something happens several times doesn’t make it right.”

“Consider four dates and four facts just for yourself. You don’t need to be a lawyer. The so-called liquor scam starts with documents registered officially in mid-2022. Mr Kejriwal is interrogated for nine hours by the CBI in mid-2023, one year later. He is arrested by the ED in March 2024 after the elections are announced and then arrested by the CBI, when he is already in custody, in June 2024,” he said. 

The senior advocate argued that the main offence in the case was filed by the CBI and the facts and context in the cases by both agencies were similar, raising the question of why there was a need to arrest Mr Kejriwal separately.

“Is he a flight risk, is he running away, is he interfering with witnesses? Why did you need to arrest him in June? This is nothing but mala fide writ large, politics writ large,” he said. 

Pointing out that Mr Kejriwal was questioned for nine hours by the CBI in 2023 and never after that, he claimed the chief minister being taken into custody in June reeked of an “insurance arrest” because the agencies knew that the case under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act was weak.  

“The CBI case is going on. In fact, we have a stronger case in the CBI case because there’s no flight risk. But the government knows, the prosecutor knows that the process is the punishment. So they’re delaying it, they do an insurance arrest. Now I start a ladder from the bottom, then I go to the high court and Supreme Court and get relief. But you have achieved your purpose. You have prolonged (the stay in jail) by a few weeks… This is not the approach of prosecutors, it is not even the approach of persecutors,” he said.  

Referencing the Supreme Court order, Mr Singhvi said the bench had also stated that mere interrogation cannot be “a need or necessity” for arrest.

New Delhi:

The Supreme Court will today deliver its verdict on Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal’s plea challenging his arrest by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in a money-laundering case.

A bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna and Dipankar Datta, which reserved its verdict on the plea on May 17, will pronounce the judgment.

Mr Kejriwal, also the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) chief, was arrested on March 21 by the ED in a money laundering case linked to the alleged Delhi liquor policy scam.

ALSO READ | Arvind Kejriwal Used Part Of “Liquor Scam” Kickbacks, Claims ED, AAP Refutes

He has challenged the April 9 order of the Delhi High Court that had upheld his arrest in the case.

The high court had upheld the 55-year-old politician’s arrest in the case, saying there was no illegality about it and that the central probe agency was left with “little option” after he skipped repeated summonses and refused to join the investigation.

The Supreme Court had on April 15 sought a response from the central probe agency on his plea challenging his arrest.

Arvind Kejriwal was earlier granted 21-day interim bail by the Supreme Court on May 10 to campaign for the Lok Sabha polls. He was directed to surrender on June 2, a day after the last phase of the seven-phased elections was scheduled to end.

He was then granted bail by a trial court in Delhi on June 20 in the case. However, the ED moved the Delhi High Court the next day and contended that the trial court’s order granting him bail was “perverse”, “one-sided” and “wrong-sided” and that the findings were based on irrelevant facts.

The high court on June 21 imposed an interim stay on the trial court’s bail order till the passing of an order on ED’s application for interim relief. The high court on June 25 also passed a detailed order staying the trial court order.

ALSO READ | Victim Of Witch-Hunt, Falsely Implicated: Arvind Kejriwal In Delhi High Court

Five days later, he was arrested by the Central Bureau Of Investigation (CBI) in connection with the corruption case related to the alleged liquor policy scam.

The Delhi Liquor Policy Case

The central probe agencies have claimed that irregularities were committed while modifying the Delhi government’s excise policy for 2021-22 and that undue favours were extended to licence holders.

The Delhi government brought in a new policy for liquor sellers in the national capital in November 2021. The Kejriwal-led government, as part of the new policy, stopped government outlets from selling liquor and allowed private parties to apply for licence to run stores.

It said the policy would help stop black marketing, increase the Delhi government’s revenue, and benefit customers.

The Delhi government, however, later scrapped the new liquor policy and reverted to the old one.

New Delhi:

The CBI has arrested a man called Rakesh Ranjan, alias Rocky, who is believed to be the kingpin in the NEET paper leak case, sources said Thursday afternoon.

Ranjan has been sent to the agency’s custody for 10 days. This comes as the CBI is also raiding four locations – two near Patna in Bihar and two near Kolkata in West Bengal – in this case.

Over a dozen people, including the principal and vice-principal of a school in Jharkhand’s Hazaribagh, have been arrested so far, as various state police forces and the CBI investigate a national racket that involves leaking of question papers for competitive exams like NEET.

NDTV Explains | If No Paper Leak, Why Arrests, And Other Big Questions

Last week a student was arrested from Patna.

The CBI has, excluding Rocky, arrested eight people in connection with this case.

Tasked with investigating the nation-wide exam paper racket, the agency has so far filed six FIRs, or first information reports, including five for three separate cases in Bihar.

On Wednesday CBI sources told NDTV the NEET paper leak may have had its origins in the Hazaribagh school. Papers leaked from there also made their way to Bihar, a CBI official said.

READ | NEET-UG Paper Leak Had Genesis In Hazaribagh: CBI Officials

Explaining the sequence of events, the CBI official said nine sets of papers for the exam, which was supposed to be held on May 5, reached a State Bank of India branch two days earlier for safekeeping. From there, two sets were transported to the Oasis School in Hazaribagh, which was a centre for the exam, and the seals on them were broken by the time they reached the school.

Agency sources said Rocky was present when the question papers were unsealed.

He took photos of the questions and shared them with ‘solver gangs’, the name given to an organised racket that provides answers to leaked papers. These were then shared with exam candidates, for prices running into the lakhs, who were trying to cheat. Rocky is also linked to another key figure in this racket, Sanjeev Mukhiya, who has been involved in this scam for two decades and is on the run.

READ | Who is Sanjeev Mukhiya? Alleged Mastermind Of NEET Paper Leak

The arrest of Ranjan, or Rocky, could bust the NEET case wide open even as the courts debate the extent of the leak of question papers. The government and the testing agencies both say the leak has been limited to localised regions and a few students.

CBI sources said that while it is not clear exactly where the papers were leaked from, what the evidence points to is the fact that it was: either from the bank branch, while in transit to the school, or from the school itself.

The NEET-UG exam is taken for admission to undergraduate medical courses.

Controversy – nearly 24 lakh students took the May 5 exam – broke last month after results were declared. The first red flags were the unusually high number of perfect scores; a record 67 students, including six from one coaching centre, scored a maximum 720. Questions were also asked over the award of ‘grace marks’ – not exam protocol, the NTA said – to 1,563 students.

Questions were also asked over the award of ‘grace marks’ to 1,563 students.

A retest for those students was held last week, but hundreds did not appear.

The entire row has made its way to the Supreme Court, which had served a notice to the under-fire NTA, or National Testing Agency, which is the central body that conducts the NEET exam.

The NTA today defended itself against claims the NEET paper had been leaked on popular messaging app Telegram, calling those images a “fake”. In an affidavit filed on Wednesday the NTA said the screenshots shared on Telegram were “fabricated”.

READ | “Manipulated”: Exam Body On “Fake” NEET Paper On Telegram

The NTA also claimed no NEET-UG question paper was found to be missing, and that no locks (of boxes containing the papers) were broken in Bihar.

READ | Why So Many NEET-UG Toppers? Exam Body’s Reply In Court

Further, the NTA also sought to explain why there were an unusually high number of high-scoring results in this year’s exam, saying “differences in new and old editions” of a textbook meant there were two correct options to one question. Removing that, the agency said, the actual number of toppers was only 17, “which is not significantly higher in numbers than previous years”.

The court is hearing a clutch of petitions seeking cancellation of the NEET-UG 2024 exam.

However, on Monday, the court said it was not for such a step.

READ | “Retest Our Last Option, Panel Must Probe Paper Leak”: Supreme Court On NEET

The three-judge bench led by Chief Justice DY Chandrachud said it therefore was loathe to order a re-test for nearly 24 lakh students – many of whom come from poor families and could ill-afford to spend money travelling to exam centres – unless necessary. A re-test is the “last option”, it said.

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New Delhi:

The NEET-UG paper leak that has put a question mark over the future of nearly 24 lakh students has its origins in Jharkhand’s Hazaribagh and has strong links to officials from one of its most prominent schools, a CBI investigation has revealed. 

Papers leaked from the city also made their way to Bihar, where the agency has made several arrests in the case, a CBI official said, adding that they have also found evidence to indicate the involvement of a solver gang in the leak. 

Explaining the sequence of events, the CBI official said nine sets of papers for the exam, which was supposed to be held on May 5, reached a State Bank of India branch two days earlier for safekeeping. From there, two sets were transported to the Oasis School in Hazaribagh, which was a centre for the exam, and the seals on them were broken by the time they reached the school.

The principal of Oasis School, Ehsanul Haque, who was the coordinator of the medical entrance exam for the entire district, and vice-principal Imtiaz Alam, who had been designated the National Testing Agency’s (NTA’s) observer and coordinator for the school, did not, however, bring the glaring lapse to the notice of the NTA.

While this pointed the needle of suspicion at them, what confirmed their involvement for the Economic Offences Wing of the Bihar Police, which was initially investigating the case, was evidence found at a safe house in Patna where two other accused in the NEET scam had given the question papers to nearly 30 candidates a day before the exam, at a cost of Rs 30-50 lakh each. 

A partially burnt question paper in the safe house bore the same code as the papers that were meant for the Oasis School in Hazaribagh.

Chain Of Custody

CBI sources said that while it is not clear exactly where the papers were leaked from, what the evidence points to is the fact that it was: (i) Either from the SBI branch (ii) While in transit to the school or (iii) From the Oasis School itself. What is clear, however, they said, is the involvement of Mr Haque and Mr Alam, who had a key role in conducting the exam not only in the school but also in the district.

The school principal, vice-principal and a local journalist, Jamaluddin, who allegedly helped them carry out the paper leak, were arrested by the CBI on June 29. 

Evidence, the sources said, also points to the involvement of the notorious Sanjeev Kumar alias Lutan Mukhiya gang, who have been involved in paper leaks before. The gang got the NEET paper from the accused and took it to their safe house in Patna, where the burnt document was found. 

Testing Agency Silent?

The CBI official said the agency had alerted the Bihar Police about the possible leak on May 5 itself and that’s what led them to the safe house. 

On May 19, the official claimed, the Economic Offences Unit wrote to the National Testing Agency, which conducts NEET, and asked which centre the code from the burnt paper matched. They got no response and the Oasis School link was conclusively established only on June 21, when, during a meeting held by Home Secretary Ajay Bhalla, the NTA officials told him that the code was from the Hazaribagh school. 

Wider Net

On Tuesday, the CBI arrested two more persons in the paper leak case. One of them is a candidate while the other is the father of another candidate. This has taken its total number of arrests in the case to 11. 

The agency is also now probing the involvement of 22 people who allegedly appeared for the exam on behalf of some of the candidates. 

The CBI is investigating six cases related to the NEET-UG exam. The First Information Report from Bihar pertains to a paper leak, while the remaining – from Gujarat, Rajasthan and Maharashtra –  are related to impersonation and cheating.

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal being brought to Rouse Avenue Court by CBI in connection with the Excise policy case, in New Delhi
| Photo Credit: ANI

The Delhi High Court on July 5 asked the CBI to respond to Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal’s bail plea in the corruption case registered by the CBI in connection with the alleged excise policy scam.

Justice Neena Bansal Krishna issued a notice to the CBI on the bail plea and listed it for further hearing on July 17.

Arvind Kejriwal hearing highlights

Senior advocate Abhishek Singhvi, representing Kejriwal, said the AAP leader is not a flight risk and not a terrorist and the CBI arrested him after he got bail in the ED’s money laundering case.

Advocate DP Singh, appearing for the CBI, raised objection over Kejriwal directly approaching the HC without first filing the bail plea before the trial court.

The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) national convener was arrested by the CBI on June 26 from Tihar Jail, where he is still lodged in judicial custody in a connected money laundering case filed by the Enforcement Directorate (ED).

Mr. Kejriwal, who was arrested by the ED on March 21, was granted bail by the trial court in the money laundering case on June 20. However, the trial court’s order was stayed by the high court.

The excise policy was scrapped in 2022 after the Delhi lieutenant governor ordered a CBI probe into alleged irregularities and corruption involving the formulation and execution of the policy.

According to the CBI and the ED, irregularities were committed while modifying the excise policy and undue favours extended to the licence holders.

Godhra:

The Central Bureau of Investigation, probing the alleged malpractices in conducting the NEET-UG exam at a private school in Godhra of Gujarat in May, on Sunday arrested its owner.

With the arrest of Dixit Patel, owner of Jay Jalaram School situated near Godhra in Panchmahal district, the number of persons arrested so far- five of them were held by Gujarat Police- has gone up to six.

Jay Jalaram School was one of the designated centres where the NEET-UG exam was held on May 5.

Mr Patel was arrested in the early hours of Sunday from his residence in Panchmahal district, said public prosecutor Rakesh Thakor.

“As the case has been handed over to the CBI by the Gujarat government, a CBI team will produce him (Dixit Patel) before a designated court in Ahmedabad to acquire his remand,” said Mr Thakor.

Mr Patel is the sixth person to be arrested in this case wherein the accused had allegedly demanded Rs 10 lakh each from at least 27 candidates to help them clear the test.

The other five persons, who were arrested earlier by the Panchmahal police, include Vadodara-based education consultant Parshuram Roy, Jay Jalaram School principal Purushottam Sharma, school teacher Tushar Bhatt, and alleged middlemen Vibhor Anand and Arif Vohra.

After taking over the probe a week back, the CBI had sought custody of four accused except Roy. On Saturday, the Godhra district court remanded Sharma, Bhatt, Anand, and Vohra to CBI’s custody till July 2.

A preliminary investigation by the CBI has uncovered that the accused persons had asked candidates willing to adopt illegal means to obtain high scores in the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET-Under Graduate) to opt for Jay Jalaram School as the exam centre.

Notably, last year’s NEET exam at the same school had exposed a crucial vulnerability wherein answer sheets were stored overnight, prompting the accused to conceive a plan to tamper with Optical Mark Recognition (OMR) sheets during this period, the CBI had told the court.

As per Gujarat Police, the accused persons allegedly asked the candidates not to attempt a question if they did not know the answer.

Prima facie, Mr Bhatt, a physics teacher, filled the correct answers on the papers while they were still at the school premises post-exam.

The CBI on Saturday raided seven locations in Gujarat, further intensifying their probe into the alleged NEET malpractices. Statements from six candidates who allegedly paid bribes were recorded last week, linking them to the accused.

A case was registered by Godhra Police on May 8 against Mr Bhatt, Mr Roy, and Mr Vohra for attempting to manipulate the NEET-UG process by extorting Rs 10 lakh from 27 candidates each. Authorities, who were tipped off about potential malpractice, preemptively intervened at the school, averting irregularities.

Mr Bhatt, appointed as the exam’s deputy superintendent at the school centre, was apprehended before the test, and Rs 7 lakh in cash was seized from him.

The investigation showed that Mr Roy had allegedly convinced at least 27 of his students that he could help them clear the exam for Rs 10 lakh. In a subsequent raid, cheques amounting to Rs 2.30 crore were discovered in Mr Roy’s office.

Mr Roy had allegedly asked his students to opt for the Godhra centre so that Mr Bhatt, Mr Sharma and others could help them.

Of the 27 students who had either paid in advance or agreed to pay money to Roy and others, only three managed to clear the exam with a passing score, while the remaining 23 failed. Investigations continue as the CBI seeks to unravel the full extent of the malpractice network. 

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

New Delhi:

The CBI registered an FIR on Friday in connection with four lakh fake students detected in Haryana government schools in 2016, officials said.

The case was handed over to the CBI on the orders of the Punjab and Haryana High Court on November 2, 2019, the officials said.

The CBI had approached the Supreme Court claiming that the investigation may require huge manpower and the probe should be given to the state police.

The top court dismissed the petition recently after which the CBI registered the FIR.

The High Court was informed in 2016 that a verification of data revealed that there were 22 lakh students in government schools in different classes, but only 18 lakh students were actually found and four lakh were fake admissions.

The court was also told that certain benefits were being given to the students who belong to backward or poor sections of the society to encourage them to attend schools and the mid day meal scheme.

The High Court had ordered the state vigilance to appoint a senior officer to enquire into the suspected siphoning off of funds for four lakh “non-existent” students by The bench ordered fixing of responsibility and also take action commensurate with the guilt proved as a measure of deterrence.

On vigilance bureau’s recommendations, seven FIRs were registered in the state.

In its 2019 order, the High Court noted that after the registration of FIRS, the investigation is “very slow”. It then transferred the probe to the Central Bureau of Investigation for a proper, thorough and expeditious investigation.

It had asked the State Vigilance to hand over all documents within a week of its order on November 2, 2019 and had asked the CBI to file a status report within three months.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Friday recovered a sack full of paper documents from the office of the West Bengal Education Department in northern Kolkata, officials said.

Although the CBI officials were tight-lipped about the nature of the documents seized from a storeroom at Bikash Bhavan in the Salt Lake area, sources said these documents will lead the agency to crucial leads relating to the multi-crore cash-for-school job case.

Sources said that although the CBI sleuths conducted raid and search operations on Wednesday and Thursday as well, the seizure of the documents happened on Friday afternoon.

The last time when the CBI sleuths came to Bikash Bhavan was in January, when they interrogated some of the top officials of the department in the case. At that time also, the investigating officials seized some documents relating to the case. Recently, the CBI officials have started probing some teachers in some-state run schools who are suspected to have played the role of middlemen in the case and whose names surfaced in the course of interrogation of some candidates who were suspects in getting appointments after paying hefty amounts through the chain of middlemen.

Sources said that 11 such teachers and two non-teaching staff, suspected to have played the role of middlemen, are currently under the scanner of the central agency officials. These are among the 35 new middlemen whose names have surfaced during the course of investigation by the sleuths in the last couple of months.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)