New Delhi: A government panel tasked with an investigation failed to flag a key change made by Aptech Limited to a contract which was floated in 2022 by Jammu and Kashmir Services Selection Board (JKSSB) for written examinations for sub-inspector posts in the police force. While the panel highlighted other changes it did not point out that a noteworthy edit ensured Aptech Limited evaded a clause related to investigations ongoing against it.
The findings of the probe committee, which was formed in the backdrop of a letter from the Union home ministry last year, have cast a shadow on the integrity of the process through which Aptech, a Mumbai-based listed company, bagged the contract for conducting a ‘computer-based test’ (CBT) for SI posts in J&K. The results of these were declared in November last year.
A three-member committee headed by IAS officer R.K. Goyal, who was then posted as additional chief secretary in J&K’s Home Department, was set up on August 22 last year to probe whether all the legal and financial conditions were fulfilled by M/s Aptech Ltd when it bagged the JKSSB contract.
However, the committee’s report has raised fresh questions about the legality of the contracting process through which 1,200 young aspirants from Jammu and Kashmir were recruited in the police force last year.
Of these, more than 1,000 sub-inspectors are from Jammu division while only 120 aspirants from Kashmir made it to the final selection list.
‘Central investigating agency’
According to the 41-page report of the committee, a copy of which is with The Wire, Aptech changed the conditions in the affidavit which was filed by all the bidders at the time of the bid submission in 2022.
Per a ‘Notice Inviting Tender’ (NIT) floated by JKSSB, all the bidders were asked to file a sworn affidavit that they were “not involved in any ongoing investigation by any investigating agency” for any malpractices in conducting such exams.
However, Aptech changed the draft to declare that it was “not involved in any ongoing investigation by any central investigating agency,” thus giving itself effective immunity from the investigations that have been launched against the company’s officials by state police forces in Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Assam for indulging in fraudulent practises, court documents obtained by The Wire show.
Interestingly, this change in the draft affidavit was not flagged either by JKSSB’s tendering committee, which was headed by a JKAS officer, Peerzada Zahoor Ahmad, also a member of JKSSB, or the official probe committee headed by IAS officer Goyal who is at present posted in the MHA.
‘As on date’
However, the committee has pointed out that Aptech changed other clauses in the affidavit. One of the changes was the addition of the term “as on date of bid submission” to a clause which stated that the companies participating in the bidding were “not blacklisted or under any Declaration of Ineligibility for corrupt of fraudulent practices with any Government department/agencies/
While the company has justified to the probe panel that the change was in line with affidavits used in tenders floated by other government departments such as the National Testing Agency, the committee has pointed out that these changes “escaped the attention” of the technical committee and it needs to be examined by finance and law departments “for appropriate action”.
“The motive and the rationale behind the changes by the bidder are not understood at this stage. It is however noted that the merits of the aforesaid change in the eligibility conditions do not appear to have been examined by JKSSB. Needless to observe that this aspect has escaped the attention of the Technical Evaluation/Purchase Committee,” the committee noted, without elaborating or suggesting any punitive measures against the officials involved in the lapse.
‘What action can be initiated’
The committee has recommended that the administration also needs to examine whether the “variation in the affidavit could have rendered M/S Aptech ab-initio ineligible”, “whether the company attempted to suppress any materials fact thereby committing a fraudulent practise” and “legal remedies” available for the government, given that the results of the SI posts have been declared more than four months back.
Per NIT, Aptech had to sign the agreement with the JKSSB for conducting the exam within ten days after it was declared as the winner of the bid, the committee has said quoting official documents. However, the committee noted that the contract was never signed and the JKSSB didn’t take any action against the company.
“It needs to be legally examined as to what action could be initiated against M/s Aptech for this default on its part,” the committee’s report noted.
Change in exam modes
The committee has also found that the the CBT mode of examination was adopted by the J&K administration without prior notification of the amendments to JKSSB regulations which were notified in December 2022, months after the examination was conducted by Aptech.
This, the committee noted, “would not appear to be legally in order”.
The JKSSB had been conducting examination for various posts in both CBT and OMR (optimal mark recognition) modes and the change from OMR to CBT mode for SI posts was effected following the directions of then chief secretary Arun Kumar Mehta during a meeting on August 23, 2022.
Official documents noted that the performance of M/s NSEIT Limited, which was empaneled by JKSSB for two years in 2021 for conducting such exams, had “by and large remained satisfactory”, yet the administration decided to discontinue the arrangement and “proceed with fresh tender proceedings”.
In CBT mode, the onus of setting the papers and maintaining the secrecy of the entire process is on the company which is hired for conducting the examination.
“The NIT issued prior to the regulations in December 2022 was not in consonance with Regulation 9 and 10 of JKSSB (Conduct of Examination) Regulations 2013 in as much as the task of setting question papers could not have been assigned to a private company,” the committee noted.
Aspirants’ challenge
The recruitment process of SI posts was challenged by a group of 40 aspirants from J&K who alleged that the company won the tender through fraudulent means and the audit company, which was hired to conduct a third-party assessment of the examination, was investigated and banned for fraud in the United States and Germany.
A single bench of the high court led by Justice Wasim Sadiq Nargal had stayed the recruitment process on December 8, 2022 which had also ordered constitution of a high-level committee headed by a retired HC judge to probe the case.
However, the government appealed the order before a division bench which referred the matter back to a single bench. In its judgement on August 31, 2023, the court had directed the J&K administration to decide the issue “on the basis of the report/recommendations made by the committee” headed by Goyal.
The findings of the committee assume significance as a CBI probe into railway exam paper leak has alleged that Aptech conspired to sell question papers to aspirants for Rs 2 lakh to Rs 5 lakh while some aspirants were also shown the papers at a hotel in Gujarat’s Surat.
Case filed
Following the disclosures, a case was filed by the central agency against Aptech officials on December 30, 2023.
Last year, a case was filed by the Ladakh police (FIR 25/2023) after allegations that the exam for direct recruitment in Kendriya Vidyalaya Schools, which was also conducted Aptech in 2023, was compromised through the use of a screen-sharing software ‘AmmyAdmin’.
Court documents obtained by The Wire show that the company officials have been accused of facilitating the installation of this screen-sharing software in at least three cases since 2018, enabling the aspirants to get their paper solved remotely while they only had to sit before the computer system at the exam centre, prompting the authorities to cancel the exams in all the three instances.
The company was blacklisted on May 23, 2019 in Uttar Pradesh after damning allegations that it had committed acts of fraud while conducting a CBT exam for the posts of junior engineers in Uttar Pradesh Power Corporation Ltd.
Similar allegations of using fraudulent practices were made against the company in the conduct of exam for vacancies in UP Jal Nigam in 2016, Rajasthan Police in 2017, Delhi University in 2018, Assam Irrigation Department in 2020 and CBSE in 2023.
The company was also fined Rs 1 crore by Securities and Exchange Board of India in 2021 for allegedly violating insider trading rules.
