CBI charges another 100 in Vyapam scam

Bhopal: The CBI on Thursday filed chargesheet against 592 accused, who included several high-level officers of the state government and chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan’s ex-personal secretary, in the Vyapam scam involving irregularities in admissions in different medical colleges in the state. This was the second chargesheet filed by the CBI in Vyapam scandal in the last one month. Th last one was on October 31, where it had charged around 490 people. The chargesheet filed on Thursday related to irregularities in admissions in different medical colleges in the state in 2012. Many students got admission in these medical colleges in the year by adopting fraudulent means with patronage from officials and influential people.

High-level officers of MP government who figured in the current CBI chargesheet filed on Thursday included former director of medical education (DME) S.C. Tiwari, former joint DME N.M. Srivastav, former director of state’s medico-legal institute D.K. Satpati and directors and deans of four leading private medical colleges in the state.

The 1150-page chargesheet filed in the CBI special court here indicated unholy nexus between the accused officials and authorities of some private medical colleges to admit undeserving students in the MBBS course. Incidentally, the special task force constituted by the state government to probe the scam earlier had given clean chit to the authorities of these private medical colleges in the scandal. The CBI has taken over the investigation into the scandal last year.

Prem Chand Prasad, former personal secretary of chief minister and his daughter also figured in the chargesheet. Both of them have earlier been granted anticipatory bail on a personal bond of Rs 50 lakh each by a local court here.

Madhya Pradesh Professional Examination Board (MPPEB), whose Hindi acronym is Vyapam, had earlier cancelled candidature of 286 MBBS students of 2012 PMT batch following the investigation by STF.

On October 31, CBI had chargesheeted 499 people, including three Vyapam officials, three “racketeers”, 17 middlemen, 297 solvers of question papers and beneficiary candidates and 170 guardians of beneficiary candidates.