The Delhi Police on Friday claimed to have unearthed a fake education board being run in the name of Board of Higher Secondary Education Delhi, which had allegedly sold forged marksheets to more than 20,000 people across five States. Six men, including the mastermind, have been arrested by Shahadara district police. The fake board has been running the racket for the past five years by Mange Ram Acharya, who is lodged in a Rajasthan jail. Shiv Prasad Pandey, the co-accused and the second in command, used to take instructions from Mange Ram, police said.

“Most of the people who bought these marksheets or degree certificates from this board are reportedly working with the Uttar Pradesh Police, Railways, Post Office, Army, paramilitary forces. We believe that officials from the Education Department and other Government departments have nexus with the accused persons,” said Nupur Prasad, Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) of Shahdara district.

“Shiv Prasad Pandey, a 65-year-old man, had been running the racket on Mange Ram’s behest since 2012. The racket had three centres. Pandey looked after the centre in lucknow. The second centre was in Vikaspuri in West Delhi where the other five accused, Parshant Solanki (22), Baljeet Singh (24), Altaaf Raza (22), lakshya Rathore (24) and Ramdev Sharma (65), worked. The third centre was located in Ramnagar in Uttarakhand. With their arrest, we have recovered 17,000 blank as well as forged marksheets, 55 rubber stamps of various universities, two scanners, two monitors, passbooks and six ATM cards among other incriminating documents,” the DCP said.

Prasad said that the racket was busted after a 25-year-old woman complained on September 11 at the Geeta Colony police station that she had been duped.

A senior police officer said, “The victim through her common friend was approached by Parshant Solanki. She had wanted to get a Class X pass certificate following which she gave him a token money of Rs 500. A deal was sealed at Rs 5,500 and she got an admit card, a marksheet and other relevant documents. However, she suspected that she had been cheated. Following which she approached the Geeta Colony police station. On verification of the marksheet from the Ministry of Human Resource Development and Delhi Government Education department, it was found to be forged.”

The officer said, “During investigation, Parshant Solanki was traced and arrested from Gokalpuri. He confessed that he worked as a computer operator. At his instance, Baljeet Singh, who was looking after the work of Director of Board in the absence of Mange Ram Acharya. Baljeet was arrested from Burari. During his interrogation, Baljeet revealed that he got the marksheets from an office-based in Vikaspuri, bearing the name “Board of Higher Secondary Education Delhi”. Consequently, a raid was conducted on the premises and Altaf Raza, Ramdev Sharma and lakhshya Rathore were arrested. Interrogation of the accused led cops to the modus operandi of the racket.”

“Each member was involved in different tasks. Their mastermind, Shiv was traced and arrested from lucknow,” police said.

 Talking about their modus operandi, Ravindra Yadav, Joint Commissioner of Police (Eastern Range) said.

“The racket used vernacular print media where they issued advertisements luring people of providing Class 10 and 12 certificates, graduation degrees and even offered schools to get affiliation of the Board in the small cities”, Yadav added.

They also advertised vacancies for the Board staff. As per information available on the website, the Board of Higher Secondary Education, Delhi claims that approximate 250-300 schools are affiliated to it. A website has been developed with the URl address (http://bhsedelhiboard.net) for portraying and establishing credibility to the public and victims. Various regional offices of the Board are running from remote localities. This Board charges Rs 10 to 50,000 from private schools for getting affiliation.

Pandey was looking after Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. On demand, this board prepared the fake marksheets or certificates within an hour. The members offered rates for affiliation with the board of Class 1st to Class 5th for Rs 10,000/-, of Class 6th to Class 8th, they charge amount of Rs 21,000/- and of Class 8th to 12th they charge amount of Rs.51,000 for the schools belonging to Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. On the other hand, they charged between Rs 1 lakh to 2.5 lakhs from the schools belonging to Punjab, Gujarat, Karnataka and Maharashtra.

To source their income, Pandey charged Rs 1500 for application form per candidate and provided model question papers and study material to the candidates. During sustained interrogation, Pandey disclosed that during 2012 alone, more than 5,000 candidates were given such fake marksheets who on the basis of these marksheet obtained Indian passports from Regional Passport Office in lucknow and procured overseas jobs. Further investigation is going on, the DCP added.