Bihar board class 12th Arts 'topper' Ganesh Kumar

PATNA: Ganesh Kumar , who was disgraced and stripped of his intermediate arts topper title for fudging his date of birth to appear in the Class XII exam conducted by the Bihar School Examination Board (BSEB), was also involved in a Rs 15 lakh fraud in Jharkhand , the Patna SSP said on Saturday.

Patna SSP Manu Maharaaj, after interrogating Ganesh, said the arts “topper” was guilty of embezzling Rs 15 lakh of a Kolkata-based chit fund company. Ganesh was an employee of the chit fund company at Giridih in Jhakhand. He escaped to Patna in 2013 after people started putting pressure on him to return the money taken by him on behalf of the chit fund company.

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“Ganesh also ‘reduced’ his age by 18 years as he was trying to get a government job in Bihar,” the SSP said, quoting Ganesh.

Ganesh also told the SSP that he got in touch with some people in Patna who helped him get enrolled in Class X at Sanjay Gandhi High School, Samastipur. Later, he got admission to Ram Nandan Singh Jagdeep Narayan College and appeared in the intermediate examinations in which he “topped”.

“We will contact the Giridih police to gather more information about Ganesh,” the SSP said. Police will also investigation the role of schools from where Ganesh appeared for Class X and Class XII examinations. Ganesh claimed he had studied for the intermediate examination and he denied paying money or conniving with anyone to top the examination,” the SSP said.

Ganesh was booked under Sections 417 (punishment for cheating), 418 (Cheating with knowledge that wrongful loss may ensue to person whose interest offender is bound to protect), 419 (punishment for cheating by personation), 420 (cheating and dishonestly inducing delivery of property), 466 (forgery of record), 468 (forgery for purpose of cheating), 208 (fraudulently suffering decree for sum not due), 201 (causing disappearance of evidence of offence or giving false information) and 120B (criminal conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code.

On June 2, an FIR (270/17) was lodged with the Kotwali police station by BSEB section officer Bipin Kumar Singh against Ganesh for forging his name and date of birth .

The complainant also mentioned in the FIR that the subject experts did not find any discrepancy in answer sheets written by Ganesh. They did not even raise a single question on Ganesh’s knowledge on the basis of the interview conducted inside the BSEB premises after the controversy surfaced.

Ganesh was sent on 14-day judicial remand by the Patna CJM court on Saturday evening.

Last year’s intermediate arts topper Ruby Rai was also arrested from the BSEB premises on June 25 and was sent to jail after she had failed to answer even simple questions regarding her subject.

In Video: Bihar topper linked to chit fund scam