Vyapam-like scam hits Tamil Nadu

Chennai: The Teachers Recruitment Board (TRB) in Tamil Nadu has unearthed a major scam in the recruitment of lecturers in Government Polytechnic Colleges that could even measure up to the scale of the infamous ‘Vyapam’ scam as over 220 candidates were found to have qualified in the written test with fake marks.

TRB has published the results of the written test and also the list of candidates who qualified for the certificate verification on November 7. The list of candidates chosen raised suspicion as many toppers were not called for the certificate verification and so sent representations to the board.

A few letters which carried the original marks of some candidates had hinted about a possible recruitment racket. Alarmed by the letters, the officials ordered a full-fledged inquiry and verified the marks with the original OMR answer sheets.

It was revealed that the marks of over 200 candidates were changed during the scanning of answer sheets and many candidates who secured just around 50 marks out of 200 have been awarded more than 150 marks to make them eligible to qualify for the next level.

The board had called the candidates for certificate verification in the ratio of 1:2 for 1,058 lecturers (engineering and non-engineering) posts. The board has since withdrawn the results of the written test and released the scanned copies of original OMR answer sheet with marks awarded for all the 1.33 lakh candidates in public domain on Monday. The board has also called for objections and representations for the new results up to December 18.