4 villas, 20 aspirants: Fresh details emerge in Karnataka job fraud probe

Investigations into alleged irregularities in the selection of veterinary doctors in Karnataka have revealed that a middleman brought as many as 20 aspirants to luxury villas near Bengaluru ahead of the entrance exam in January.

The separate investigations by the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) and Enforcement Directorate (ED) into the alleged Karnataka Public Service Commission (KPSC) recruitment scam show that a middleman, Basavaraj Kannale, booked four villas in a gated community in Devanahalli on the outskirts of Bengaluru on January 8 to provide leaked question papers to aspirants for the 400 posts of veterinary doctors.

As many as 1,400 aspirants appeared for the entrance exams for the 400 veterinary doctors’ posts in the state government, and 329 were selected. Several top scorers with over 80 per cent have been linked to exam fraud after analysis of their previous academic performance.

‘More candidates involved’

A caretaker for the Airbnb facility has told investigators that 20 people were accommodated in the villas, which were booked at a cost of around Rs 80,000 by Kannale, who has been arrested by both CID and ED.

Kannale allegedly booked one villa with three rooms initially and later three more villas. He allegedly paid Rs 37,000 in advance through bank transfers to rent the villas, and paid the remaining amount in cash while leaving the property.

While Kannale has claimed he gave the leaked question papers in lieu of bribes ranging from Rs 20 lakh to Rs 40 lakh to only nine aspirants, CID and ED probes indicate the involvement of more aspirants, sources familiar with the investigations said.

The CID probe, which is set to be handed to a Special Investigation Team (SIT) on the basis of a Karnataka High Court order, has so far identified 11 candidates who paid Rs 80 lakh in bank transfers to accounts Kannale gave them for access to questions.

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Kannale and his associates allegedly found candidates willing to pay to be recruited as government veterinarians.

“There were more candidates involved other than those already identified. The new batch of candidates are those who came into direct contact with Kannale for recruitment without the other middlemen. The process of identifying these candidates is currently underway,” a source said.

Kannale, whose bail plea was rejected by a special court on Tuesday, has claimed during questioning by the probe agencies that some candidates were also referred by the KPSC chairman Sahukar Shivashankarappa, who is under investigation for the recruitment scam.

IAS officer under scanner

The questions for the main KPSC exam for the selection of veterinary doctors, held on January 9 in Bengaluru, are alleged to have been leaked through the KPSC’s exam controller, Gyanendra Kumar Gangwar, an IAS officer. CID and the ED have also arrested Gangwar.

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The probe has revealed that Gangwar provided the question paper for the veterinary officers’ entrance exam, along with the answers, on January 7 to Kannale on a pen drive when he visited the officer at his house.

Kannale also claimed that he paid Gangwar Rs 1.3 crore out of Rs 1.5 crore collected as advance for the paper leaks. He has also been found to be the sponsor of Rs 52 lakh worth of jewellery purchased by the IAS officer for a friend.

During the probe, CID and ED also found an apartment belonging to the IAS officer’s brother on the outskirts of Bengaluru, which the KPSC fraudsters used, sources said. The probe agencies are analysing CCTV footage from the apartment.

The probe agencies have frozen Rs 64 lakh in the Om Lakshmi Souharda Sahakari Bank, where aspirants allegedly transferred the money as part of the bribe, and Rs 5.20 lakh in a Kotak Mahindra Bank account, where the bribe was moved.

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The bank accounts of Kannale and his wife, with Rs 71.18 lakh, have also been frozen, and Rs 5.76 lakh in cash has been seized.

Kannale allegedly acted as a manager of Gangwar’s illegal finances for several years, since they built an association in 2019 in Bidar, where the IAS officer served as the district’s chief executive officer.

ED, which took Gangwar’s custody Tuesday, is expected to seek Kannale’s custody as well this week after a fresh two-day custody period with CID, which began on Sunday.

Shivakumar on probes

Meanwhile, Karnataka Chief Minister D K Shivakumar said Tuesday that the state government should have been given “the freedom to appoint investigators” to probe the alleged KPSC recruitment scam and the selection of the KPSC chairman’s daughter for a government job based on a fake income certificate to qualify for reservations.

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“I welcome the High Court’s direction to form an SIT. ED is also investigating. However, our police department is also conducting the investigation very well. If the court needed to, it could have looked into the investigation of our police department,” Shivakumar said.

“It is right that the court has directed the SIT to investigate. However, the state government should have been given the freedom to appoint investigators. We have received calls from Delhi and other states regarding this. I will seek the opinion of legal experts on this,” he added.