CBI grills key suspect in Rs 250-cr scholarship scam

Bhanu P Lohumi

Tribune News Service

Shimla, September 20

CBI sleuths quizzed the key suspect in the Rs 250-crore scholarship scam in Education Department for seven hours today and sought details of his bank accounts, financial transactions and over a dozen files and other documents recovered from his residences.

Arvind Rajta (key suspect) was called by the CBI following raids conducted by them at his three premises at Dhalli, ancestral house at Kalbhog and his brother’s house at Bhattakufar yesterday during which 13 filed, including those containing documents of scholarship, were seized. The CBI questioned him regarding the source of his income as hard disks of computers, pen drive, bank pass books, cheque books and other incrementing documents were also seized.

Following information extracted from him during questioning, over a dozen officials, including former directors, joint directors and other officials holding important positions during the period scam took place, are under radar of the CBI and having sleepless nights.

Interestingly, the concerned person was transferred many a times but every time he managed to get his transferred cancelled and remained in the same seat which indicates alleged complicity of senior officials. The CBI has gathered enough evidence against him but not arrested him so far. His arrest is not ruled out, sources said.

Arvind, who was a senior assistant and was later promoted as Grade-II superintendent in Education Department, was key person dealing with disbursement of scholarships and had access to all the related documents. He had also undergone training on software used for disbursement of scholarship.

The CBI had registered the case under Sections 409,419,465,466 and 471 of the IPC in May 2019 and conducted raids at over 300 educational institutions in Himachal and the neighbouring states before conducting search raids at three houses yesterday.

The scam started in 2013-14 when the scholarships for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Backward classes for pre-matric and post-matric students under 36 schemes were not paid to eligible students and 80 per cent scholarships money was paid to private institutions. The scam was unearthed following reports that the students of government schools in tribal Spiti valley in Lahaul and Spiti district had not been paid scholarship for past five years.

80% money paid to pvt institutes

The scam began in 2013-14 when the scholarships for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Backward Classes for pre-matric and post-matric students under 36 schemes were not paid to eligible students and 80 per cent scholarships money was paid to private institutions. The scam was unearthed following reports that the students of government schools in tribal Spiti valley in Lahaul and Spiti district had not been paid scholarship for past five years.

Fake accounts opened

• Accounts of 32,000 students were not credited with the scholarship amount
• As many as 272 private educational institutions are under scanner
• Fake accounts were opened in three nationalised banks
• Ineligible candidates were given admissions in private institutes