What is Vyapam scam?

The Supreme Court on Monday said it would hear a petition on July 9 seeking dismissal of Madhya Pradesh Governor Ram Naresh Yadav. It alleged Yadav’s involvement in the Vyapam scam. The Madhya Pradesh Professional Examination Board (MPPEB) or MP Vyavsayik Pareeksha Mandal (Vyapam) has been in headlines with mysterious deaths of scam accused and an investigating journalist, with the death toll reportedly crossing 46.

The deaths include accused and witnesses as well as a journalist who was investigating the story, and have largely been under mysterious circumstances. Three more people died in strange circumstances in the last three days. One was the Dean of a Jabalpur Medical College Dr Arun Sharma and the other is Aaj Tak journalist Akshay Singh, who was covering the scam.

A female trainee sub-inspector who was recruited through the MPPEB, committed suicide by jumping in a lake in the Sagar district of Madhya Pradesh. The three-time Chief Minister, Shivraj Singh Chouhan, is under tremendous pressure to order a CBI probe into the matter; he vehemently denies any need for it, saying a Special Investigation Team investigation would do.

The MPPEB has been responsible for conducting Pre-Engineering, Pre-Medical, MCA, Teaching etc since 1982. The current accusations mostly involve teaching recruitments. Complaints of irregularities while conducting the examinations first surfaced in 2009, and the scam blew over in 2013. One of the first complaints was registered way back in 2000, but it was only by 2007 that the scam came to fore as a full-fledged professional racket.

Investigations and arrests started in 2013 after new details emerged. Dr Anand Rai from Indore filed a PIL alleging corruption in the Vyapam, which prompted the MP High Court to order a special investigation in July 2013. Another whistle blower, a forensic expert Prashant Pandey, has been provided security as ordered by the Delhi High Court.

A DNA report said that VYAPAM's Assistant Programmer CK Mishra, System Analyst Nitin Mahindra and his associate Ajay Sen, who were arrested at first, had a key role to play in the fraud. The three allegedly used to make changes in original marksheets to get their students a passing score. As the dots were connected, names of big businessmen as well as prominent politicians cropped up. Investigation based on the data obtained from the hard disks reveal that many candidates who appeared in the examinations had someone's backing.