The Special Investigation Team (SIT) set up to probe in to the the alleged multi-crore SC-ST scholarship scam arrested the chairperson of one private university and four officials of a private educational institution in Roorkee area of Haridwar district on Saturday. The accused were presented in the court on Sunday. They have been charged under sections 420, 409 and 120b of the Indian Penal Code. The five accused were sent by the Haridwar district court to 14 days judicial custody.
The head of the SIT probing this case, Manjunath TC told The Pioneer, “Hall clerk Ankur Rana, hall treasurer Sharad Gupta, hall secretary and hall member Yogendra Pal were arrested on Saturday. They haven’t answered our questions satisfactorily during the interrogation. Further, the chairperson of a private university in Roorkee, Manika Sharma was also arrested. The investigation is still in process. All the accused were presented in the court on Sunday from where they were sent to 14 days judicial custody.”
It is worth mentioning here that on May 16, deputy director of tribal welfare and former Haridwar district social welfare officer Anurag Shankhdhar was arrested by the SIT and has been sent by the court on 14 days judicial custody. He has been accused of embezzling crores of scholarship money released by the government for SC/ ST students. SIT in their investigation has established that Shankhdhar was using his power as a government employee to benefit private education institutes.
According to a Press release issued by the SIT, the actions of the Roorkee based educational institutions are also being investigated. During the investigation so far SIT found out that during the years before 2014-15, some of the students on behalf of the institute took scholarship money were in fact never enrolled there. After year 2014 during the distribution of online scholarship, the money had been taken through the names of those students who had never even registered their names in the institute. Transaction of scholarship money directly into the bank account of accused hall clerk Ankur Rana has also been found, on which basis he was arrested.
