Assam APSC scam: Court takes cognizance of 9 officers omitted from SIT chargesheet

Guwahati: The Special Judge Court of Assam has taken suo motu cognizance against nine ACS and APS officers who allegedly secured jobs fraudulently but were not included in the charge sheet filed by the Special Investigation Team (SIT) probing the APSC cash-for-job scam.

The investigating officer (IO) of the case, in its 14th charge sheet submitted to the special court, excluded the names of five APS officers—Nabanita Sharma, Ashima Kalita, Amritraj Choudhury, Rituraj Dolcy, and Swarup Kumar Bhattacharjya—and four ACS officers—Nandita Hazarika, Tridip Roy, Bikram Aditya Bora, and Jagadish Brahma.

The Special Investigation Team (SIT) omitted the names of these 14 officers, who were previously accused by the Biplab Sarma One-Man Enquiry Commission.

In an order on Tuesday, the Special court observed that the investigating officer did not submit the chargesheet against these nine others "but the case diary shows that there is enhancement of marks in the final tabulation sheet of these candidates."

After finding "prima facie materials of offences" under sections 109/120-B/420/465/468/471 of the Indian Penal Code along with section 12 of the Prevention of Corruption Act, the court took cognizance of offenses committed by these nine candidates.

The court did not find any prima facie materials against five other candidates mentioned in the B.K. Sharma committee report.

The accused have been asked to appear in court on October 1.

While the high court had earlier expressed doubts over the investigation done by the then IO Surjeet Singh Panesar, Assam Police was compelled to change the IO of the newly constituted SIT after the court of Special Judge disagreed with the findings of previous IO Prateek Thube.

The SIT on September 12 had filed the final chargesheet in the APSC cash-for-job scam. Investigating officer Upen Kalita submitted the 156-page document to the Special Court in Guwahati, naming 23 gazetted officers as accused.

However, the chargesheet faced criticism due to the omission of 14 officers previously implicated in the scam. This follows a previous attempt by IPS officer Pratik Thube to file a chargesheet, which was rejected by the court for significant flaws.

In June 2024, the Special Judge’s Court rejected the SIT report and ordered a re-inquiry. The court had also ordered the removal of the investigating officer, Pratik Thube, from the SIT.

A one-man commission headed by Justice (Retired) Biplab Kumar Sharma accused nearly 50 officers of securing jobs through unfair means in the 2013 and 2014 Combined Competitive Examinations (CEE) conducted by the APSC.

The Sharma Commission report, kept pending by the Assam government for a significant period, ultimately led to the formation of the SIT.

Led by IPS officers M.P. Gupta, who also holds the charge of ADGP of CID, and Pratik Thube, the SIT reportedly questioned several accused officers but only arrested five.