Rajasthan Paper Leak 'Kingpins' Made Crores, But Money Wasn't Only Motive

In a big breakthrough for the Special Operations Group investigating the paper leak cases in Rajasthan, four suspected kingpins of the racket have been arrested. The arrests have also revealed that the objective of the four men, who are government employees themselves, was not just to make money - which they did by the bucketload - but also to ensure that their relatives got government jobs.

In the past five years, there have been seven high-profile exams in which papers were leaked and the issue is seen to have contributed to the Ashok Gehlot-led Congress government's loss in the state in last year's elections. The four arrests have been made in connection with the Junior Engineer exam, which was held in December 2020.

The four accused who have been arrested are Harshwardhan Meena, who is a revenue official, Rajendra Yadav, who is a government teacher, Shivratan Mot, a librarian and Rajendra Kumar Yadav, alias Raju, a police sub-inspector. The police said they suspect that the four men worked in tandem with the cheating rings operating in the state and were among the kingpins of the paper leak operation.

Police believe Meena did not only make crores from leaking papers but that he and his family were involved in getting dummy candidates appear for the exams. Like Meena, his wife is also a revenue official, and she is alleged to have made a dummy candidate sit for a police sub-inspector exam. She had, however, failed the physical test.

Meena's brother has also been arrested earlier for setting up a dummy candidate for the senior teacher exam

Yadav, a government school teacher, was part of conducting the junior engineer exam and is believed to be the mastermind behind the paper leak. He was the one who allegedly took a photo of the paper and sold it to Meena for Rs 50 lakh. Meena, in turn, made crores from selling it to interested candidates.

An official said Yadav ensured that his son became a junior engineer, and his daughter-in-law is also a senior government teacher

VK Singh, Additional Director General of Police, Special Operations Group, said, "Harshwardhan Meena was picked up from the Nepal border. The groups linked to cheating and leaking of papers in the state sometimes cooperate and, at other times, they compete with each other."

Officials said that, apart from the four men who have been arrested, the role of 50 government employees from various departments is under the scanner.