The Vile Parle police in Mumbai arrested a teacher who conducts private classes in Malad for allegedly leaking the chemistry paper of the HSC examination to his students minutes after the exam began on Saturday.
The teacher, identified as Mukesh Yadav, was produced before a court and remanded in judicial custody.
The police suspect that one of the students clicked a photograph of the question paper, by sneaking a phone into the examination hall, and forwarded it to the teacher who then sent it to some of his students.
Insisting that it is not a case of paper leak, but a “copy case”, chairperson of the Maharashtra State Board Sharad Gosavi said, “The question paper is distributed to students at 10.20 am and a part of the chemistry question paper was found on a girl student’s phone at 10.25 am. This is after the exam had already begun, so it cannot be a paper leak.”
“However, prompt action was taken immediately by the Mumbai division of the state board and the specific exam centre was asked to file a police complaint,” he added.
The incident came to light after a girl student at an exam centre in Vile Parle turned up late for the examination. “She wanted to enter the exam hall at 10.50 am. The student claimed that she was in the toilet. This is beyond the delayed entry permitted by any exam centre, so the divisional board office was approached to check if the student could be allowed to appear for the exam,” Gosavi explained.
“The centre head was asked to follow the procedure of thorough checking of the student, which included checking her phone. It was then that some part of the chemistry paper was found on her mobile phone. Soon, the girl was taken into custody and the exam centre approached the police. Another person was arrested by the police based on the information provided by this girl,” he shared, adding that the student was not allowed to appear for the paper.
Asked about what could have caused the breach and how viral the photographs had gone, Gosavi said, “The police will trace the viral path. But after the paper starts, the information could have gone out from anywhere.”
“It was not a paper leak (which happens prior to the exam). After the exam paper was given to students, some student leaked it by clicking a photo and sending it to the arrested accused who further circulated it,” said Sanjay Narvekar, senior police inspector of Vile Parle police station.
The police soon found that Yadav was involved in circulating the paper. They said it was also circulated on a WhatsApp group. The officers are now trying to determine how many students had received the paper and if Yadav has previously indulged in such malpractices.