The Enforcement Directorate (ED) arrested the owner of a Jaipur-based private school on June 21, as part of its money-laundering probe in a case involving the alleged leak of the Rajasthan Eligibility Examination for Teachers (REET) 2021 question paper, official sources said.
Ram Kripal Meena was taken into custody under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) and produced before a special court here. The court sent him to the federal agency’s custody till June 27, the sources said.
The ED informed the court that Meena was “one of the main persons who conceptualised and was instrumental in the execution of the question paper leak of REET examination and has also connived with others in collection or acquisition and laundering of the proceeds of crime”.
It accused Meena of laundering about Rs 1.03 crore (out of Rs 5 crore).
Meena, the owner of a private school in Jaipur, was appointed as a deputy district coordinator, along with three others, of Jaipur for REET 2021 by a retired professor named Pradeep Parashar.
The professor, in turn, was appointed as the district coordinator for the said exam by the Rajasthan Board of Secondary Education (RBSE), Ajmer, the ED told the court while seeking Meena’s custody.
Meena, it said, “executed a deal for leaking the REET paper with Uda Ram Bishnoi (another accused) in lieu of Rs 5 crore, in connivance with Pradeep Parashar”.
“The REET 2021 paper was stolen from the ‘strong room’ at Shiksha Sankul, Jaipur by Ram Kripal Meena on the night of 24.09.2021, who was working with Pradeep Parashar,” it alleged.
The ED said its probe found that according to the RBSE’s rules, the exam booklet was to be kept at the treasury or the sub-treasury or a police station of the district but this direction was “not followed” in Jaipur.
Bishnoi, the agency alleged, “collected the amount from various candidates and handed over the paper to them with the help of middlemen”.
A total of 62 people, including Meena, Parashar and Bishnoi, were arrested by the Special Operations Group (SOG) of the Rajasthan Police, which subsequently filed three chargesheets against them.
The ED sought Meena’s custodial interrogation to “ascertain and identify the modus operandi” of the alleged paper leak and confront him with various deeds of immovable assets that were found from his premises during raids conducted in Jaipur on Tuesday.
“The custodial interrogation of Ram Kripal Meena is essential to locate the exact trail of money as to from whom he collected the money or proceeds of crime and to ascertain who all are involved in the acquisition of the proceeds of crime in connivance with the arrestee (Meena),” the ED told the court.
The agency conducted searches at 27 locations in Jaipur, Jodhpur, Udaipur, Ajmer, Dungarpur, Barmer, Sikar and Jalore on June 5 as part of its probe into the REET paper leak case and a similar case of the senior teachers grade-II examination in 2022.
The money-laundering case filed by the ED in April stems from two FIRs lodged by the SOG (Rajasthan Police) in connection with the alleged REET paper leak.
Source: PTI
Also Read: Rajasthan: ED conducts searches in paper leaks case
Posted in News, States
