CBI sleuths from its anti-corruption branch on Saturday interrogated a suspect in Uttar Pradesh’s Kushinagar after registering a case in connection with the UGC-NET paper leak case, sources said.
A CBI official said the suspect, a 30-year-old man, had allegedly posted a portion of the paper on instant messaging service Telegram.
“A preliminary probe has revealed that the suspect had undertaken coaching for the examination in Kota, Rajasthan,” the official said.
The CBI registered an FIR in the UGC-NET paper leak case on Thursday against unidentified people on a reference from the Union education ministry amid the row over the alleged irregularities in this year’s National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET), with the issue now before the Supreme Court.
There have been allegations of paper leaks in states like Bihar and other irregularities in NEET. The allegations have triggered protests in several cities and petitions have been filed in high courts and the Supreme Court.
The UGC-NET 2024 examination for the selection ofjunior research fellows, assistant professors and PhD scholars was conducted by the National Testing Agency on June 18 in two shifts acrossthe country.
The next day, the University Grants Commission (UGC) received inputs from the national cyber crime threat analytics unit of the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C) that the question paper was available on the darknet and allegedly being sold for ₹5-6 lakh on messaging platforms, sources said.
According to the complaint from the ministry, the inputs from I4C, which functions under the Union home ministry, “prima-facie indicate that the integrity of the examination may have been compromised”.
