DISPUR: In a sensational development, Assam police on Wednesday daughter of BJP MP and 18 other government officers for their alleged involvement in the multi-crore cash-for-jobs scam of Assam Public Service Commission (APSC taking the number of total arrests in the case to 55.)
APS officer Pallabi Sharma, the daughter of Bharatiya Janata Party leader and Lok Sabha MP from Tezpur constituency, R.P. Sharma, among those arrested as their handwriting did not match with their answer sheets in the APSC examination held in 2016, according to police.
All the 19 officers entered the Special Branch headquarters around 10 a.m where they were arrested later.
“We have already collected their handwriting from their offices concerned. We have also carried out forensic tests on their handwriting and matched with those recovered from the fake answer sheets recovered from the Assam Public Service Commission (APSC),” said Dibrugarh Superintendent of Police Goutam Bora.
Earlier, police had filed charge sheet against former Assam Public Service Commission (APSC) chairman Rakesh Kumar Paul and few other members in connection with the case.
Additional Superintendent of Police of Dibrugarh Police, Surajeet Singh Panesar told ANI, “So far 63 officers have been arrested in the case. Today, we have arrested 19 officers, out of which eight are women.”
Police had earlier identified 25 officers of the 2015 batch who had bribed APSC officials to get jobs through doctored answer scripts.
Out of those 25 officials, 13 were in Assam Civil Services, seven in Assam Police Services and the rest are in allied civil services.
On November 8, police arrested 16 civil services officials in this regard.
Former APSC chairman Rakesh Kumar Paul was arrested on November 4 last year after the arrest of its two members — Samedur Rahman and Basanta Kumar Doley.
IANS/ANI inputs