The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) says it has detected a recruitment scam at the prestigious Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology in Pune, registered a case against its Advisor and carried out searches at her residence during which documents related to deposits of over ₹1 crore were recovered.

The CBI has registered a case against Chabi Bardhan, the then Private Secretary to the Director and now working as Advisor at the Institute, Sanjay Hasnale, in-charge of the transport cell and Amit Kumar, upper division clerk at the Institute.

An SMS seeking Bardhan’s reaction remained unanswered. IITM’s Public Relations Officer, H P Borgaonkar, did not respond to an e-mail seeking his reaction either.

The agency carried out searches at the officis and residences of three persons during which three bank accounts having fixed deposits receipts of ₹1.16 crore were recovered from Bardhan’s home, CBI sources said.

The CBI has registered a case against the accused under IPC for criminal conspiracy, cheating, forgery and under provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act among others, agency spokesperson Kanchan Prasad has said.

“It is alleged that the accused persons had indulged in corrupt practices relating to recruitment of personnel for different posts in IITM during 2010-2014 and obtained pecuniary benefits from ineligible candidates who were appointed at IITM,” she said.

The spokesperson said documents regarding alleged employment of candidates on forged certificates and information on some other ineligible candidates, two computer hard discs and electronic data purportedly showing leakage of questions and answers of the examination conducted in 2014 for the post of Assistant Manager in IITM were seized.

Other documents recovered during the searches included diploma certificates of Fitter and Turner, suspected to be forged, and sale deeds of two immovable properties, the spokesperson said.

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