SSC CGL paper leak case: Sify staffers among 17 booked by CBI

The question paper for the examination was found on social media minutes before the examination started in February. The incident led to widespread protests by students, forcing the government to order a CBI probe.

SSC paper leak case: Sify staffers among 17 booked by CBI

Going by the pattern of the questions leaked, the investigating agency managed to locate seven students who would have received the questions in that particular pattern.

The CBI has booked 17 people, including 10 employees of Sify Technologies and seven students, in connection with the recent Staff Selection Commission (SSC) paper leak case. The agency on Wednesday conducted searches at 12 locations across the country in connection with the case.

The question paper for the examination was found on social media minutes before the examination started in February. The incident led to widespread protests by students, forcing the government to order a CBI probe.

Searches were conducted on Wednesday at 12 locations across the country. These included four offices of the Sify Technologies Pvt Ltd in Chennai, Noida, Mumbai and in Okhla in New Delhi, besides the residence of one of its employees, Sant Prasad Gupta, in Sheikh Sarai area of the national capital, sources said.

The search operation also covered seven examination labs in Patna, Shimla, Ambala and Jaipur and three places in Delhi.

According to the FIR, the paper for the second tier of the Combined Graduate Level (CGL), 2017, which took place on February 21, 2018, and its answer key were allegedly leaked and went viral on social media before the examination.

The seven students named in the FIR had appeared in the examination and were identified on the basis of the screenshot of the question paper which was allegedly leaked. The examination papers were set in such a way that an examinee got the questions in a certain ‘sequence’, sources said.

Going by the pattern of the questions leaked, the investigating agency managed to locate seven students who would have received the questions in that particular pattern.

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Sant Prasad Gupta, custodian of the question bank at Sify, and nine other employees of the company who were site managers at seven examination centres where the leaked paper had reached, have also been named in the FIR, sources said.