RO/ARO Paper Leak: Why trust on private printing press despite having a government press? Candidates raised questions

The STF, which is investigating the paper leak case in the Review Officer (RO) / Assistant Review Officer (ARO) Preliminary Examination-2023, has revealed that the paper was leaked from a printing press in Bhopal. Earlier, there were allegations of leakage of the LT grade teacher recruitment paper from the printing press.

Candidates have raised questions that despite having a government printing press in the state, why does the commission have so much trust in a private printing press? However, for the purity of the examinations and the security of the papers, the demand has already been raised that the question papers of the recruitment examinations should be printed in the government printing press only.

Many years ago, a proposal was also made to print the question papers in the Government Press of Prayagraj, but this proposal went into the waste basket and the recruitment institutions kept printing the papers in private printing presses as per their own. Earlier in March 2018, an advertisement was issued for recruitment to 10768 posts of LT grade teachers. There were allegations of leakage of Hindi and Social Science subject papers in the examination.

The investigation into the matter was handed over to the STF. The investigation revealed that the papers were leaked from a private printing press in Kolkata, West Bengal. In this case, ST arrested the printing press operator. Later, the then examination controller of the commission, Anju Katiyar, was also arrested and later got bail from the court.

Now, in NEET too, the matter of a paper leak from a private printing press in Ahmedabad is coming to the fore. Despite the involvement of private printing presses in the paper leak, no improvement has been made in this direction. Candidates are raising questions as to why papers are not printed in government printing presses, while all the confidential documents of the government are printed in these government printing presses.

No control over private printing presses

The government has no control over private printing presses regarding the confidentiality of papers and in such a situation, there is no direct accountability of any government officer or employee in incidents like paper leaks. For this reason, there is a constant demand that the papers should be printed in government printing presses only so that the accountability of officers and employees can be fixed.

If the name of the press is confidential, how did the mafia reach there?

No one except the examination controller in UPPSC knows in which printing press the question papers are sent for printing. In such a situation, how are the copy mafias reaching the concerned printing presses? Through whom is this information being conveyed to the last copy mafia where the question papers have been sent for printing?

Candidates wrote a letter to the Chief Minister

Prashant Pandey, media in-charge of Pratiyogi Chhatra Sangharsh Samiti, and other competitive students have written a letter to the Chief Minister demanding that the question papers of all the examinations should be printed only in government printing presses. Also, examinations should not be conducted through private agencies. A separate government mechanism should be developed for conducting the examination.