Patna: The Special Investigation Team (SIT) probing the Bihar topper scandal is now considering cases against 44 more students who passed the Grade 12 Bihar board exam through fraudulent ways. All these students had appeared from the Vishun Rai (VR) College in Vaishali district in the intermediate examination conducted in February-March this year.
The students came on SIT’s radar after an investigation into the scandal revealed each of them had been allotted double registration and roll numbers to appear at the examination. “While in one roll number, they had failed, in another they were declared successful with first class marks,” said Patna’s senior superintendent of police Manu Maharaj who heads the SIT.
The police official also said SIT had recommended the Bihar School Examination Board (BSEB) to cancel results of all such students caught committing fraud. Of the 44 students caught on the wrong foot, 32 belong to science stream, 10 are from arts stream and the remaining two are from the commerce stream. One of them happens to be Shalini Rai, daughter of Baccha Rai who is the principal of VR College, which is now in the eye of a storm.
The SIT has already registered cases against four toppers in the grade 12 school board exam scandal, including Ruby Rai, Shalini Rai, Saurabh Shreshtha and Rahul Kumar. Of them, only Ruby Rai has been sent to jail, whereas the raids are on to arrest the remaining three absconding toppers.
The police have also arrested many bigwigs in connection with the scandal after they were found closely involved in the scam. They include Lalkeshwar Prasad, former chairman of the Bihar School Examination Board (BSEB), his wife Usha Sinha who is the principal of a government college; Harihar Nath Jha and Sriniwas Chandra Tiwari, both ex-BSEB secretaries, and Baccha Rai, principal of the college. All are now in jail.
The scam surfaced last month following a television sting which showed majority of toppers were not even aware of the subjects they had opted for in the examination and were lacking in basic knowledge. One of the toppers Ruby Rai who was the topper in arts stream could not even properly pronounce political science famously calling it ‘prodigal science’ and said the subject was all about cooking.
