Fake caste certificate scam: 2 DU staffers held

Two employees of Delhi University's Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribe cell were arrested in New Delhi for their alleged links with a racket involved in helping students get admission in colleges on the basis of fake caste certificates.

The arrested have been identified as Neeraj and Sanjeet, a senior police official said.

The racket led by Himanshu Gupta allegedly managed to secure admissions for 12 students, including four girls, this admission season in eight colleges and was smashed by Delhi Police's Crime Branch on June 23 with the arrest of three youths, including a contract employee in a tehsildar office.

"The interrogation of the three persons led to the arrest of two DU employees," the official said.

Those arrested on June 23 were Himanshu (26) and his associates Vikas (24) and Ketan Gupta (24), who is a a data entry operator on contract basis at Mehrauli tehsildar office.

On the modus operandi, the official said, Himanshu and Vikas floated an educational consultancy firm and advertised in leading newspapers in Delhi and other cities about facilitating admissions. They charged Rs 3-5 lakh for getting a student admitted in the college of their choice.

In this academic session, 10 forged caste certificates shown as issued from the office of Tehsildar in Mehrauli, were allegedly prepared by Ketan.

"Data of the forged certificates was uploaded by Ketan on the official website so that if anybody checked its authenticity, the same could be verified from the official website. Three forged caste certificates shown as issued from the office of Tehsildar in Ghaziabad were prepared by one of their associates Satish who is absconding," he said.

The gang was operating since 2008. In the previous years, they have secured admission of students in Delhi University on the basis of forged caste certificates which were shown to have been issued in Ghaziabad.