A Special Court hearing the Vyapam case on Saturday issued a stern warning to the CBI after it failed to provide to the accused copies of the chargesheet filed against them more than three weeks ago. The central agency, which took over the investigation in August 2015 as directed by the Supreme Court, had on October 31 submitted the chargesheet in the Special CBI court against 490 persons in connection with irregularities in the pre-medical test (PMT) 2013. Given the large number of accused persons that include top officials of the examination body, racketeers, middlemen, students and guardians, the agency had sought time till November 25 to provide a copy of the chargesheet in a CD to each of them. “.Documents have been scanned but preparing copies of the same would be undertaken in our training centre at Ghaziabad which has the facilities to undertake voluminous work in shortest possible time,” the agency told the court, seeking time till December 20. Advocate Ehtesham Qureshi, representing main accused Nitin Mahindra, objected to the delay and cited Section 207 of the CrPC to argue that providing a copy to the accused was mandatory. Special Judge S C Upadhyay warned CBI that he would act according to provisions of the law if it failed to provide copies on December 20. Many of the accused were present outside the court on Saturday. Meanwhile, Leader of Opposition Ajay Singh said the CBI chargesheet filed on November 23 in connection with irregularities in the PMT 2012 has put a question mark on the police probe. “When PMT examinations were being rigged, the chief minister held the charge of medical education. Now that officials of the directorate of medical education have been charged, should his accountability also not be fixed,’’ Singh said.
