FIR registered in scholarship scam

Bhanu P Lohumi

Tribune News Service

Shimla, November 17

A case of cheating and forgery has been registered at the Chotta Shimla police station in the 210-crore scholarship scam on the complaint of Shakti Bhushan, inquiry officer of the Education Department. 

In his complaint to the police on Saturday, Bhushan said he was appointed as the inquiry officer in the multi-crore scholarship scam by the Secretary, Education. During the course of inquiry, he found that 250 students of Kangra district had 

taken admission in Fathepur and Vadukhar centres of Karnataka and Lovely University.

He alleged that at the time of the filling of forms, the management of these universities had declared to grant scholarship to students of the SC/ST category. It was supposed to be transferred to their account linked with Aadhar. However, the institutes did not give any kind of scholarship to the students and the funds were found deposited in another fake account opened by misusing the Aadhar numbers of the students.

A case of cheating, forgery and using forged documents as genuine has been registered under Section 419, 465, 466 and 471 of the IPC. 

Was unearthed in July 

The scam was unearthed in July this year following reports that students of government schools in the Spiti valley had not been paid scholarships for the past five years.