Vyapam scam: CBI chargesheets 592 accused

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Thursday filed a chargesheet against 592 accused, including chairmen of four private medical colleges in Madhya Pradesh, government officials in the medical education department and key officials of the Professional Examination Board (PEB), in connection with the Vyapam scam case.

Those named by the agency are JN Choksey, chairman of LN Medical College; SN Vijaywargiya of People’s Medical College; Ajay Goenka of Chirayu Medical College and Suresh Singh Bhadoriya of Index Medical College, apart from 22 other officials of the colleges, The Hindu reported.

The Vyapam scam broke out in 2013 with the arrest of 20 people in Indore, and since then more than 40 people, including witnesses, accused, and alleged beneficiaries, have died mysteriously. The Supreme Court had asked the CBI to probe the alleged conspiracy to eliminate suspects and the deaths of 24 individuals.

Former Vyapam officials figuring in the CBI chargesheet are then Vyapam director Pankaj Trivedi, senior system analyst Nitin Mohindra, then deputy system analyst Ajay Kumar Sen, and then programmer CK Mishra. All four have reportedly filed for anticipatory bail.

“A total of 334 impersonators and beneficiaries, 155 guardians of the beneficiaries who paid for ensuring that their wards could copy answers from those of the impersonators, four Vyapam officials, 46 exam invigilators, 22 middlemen and two officials of the state’s department of medical education have also been named,” the report said, quoting a CBI official.

A report in The Times of India said that many among those named in the chargesheet on Thursday were earlier let off by the Madhya Pradesh special task force during probe.