Fraud using Chinese smartwatch helped SFI leaders ace PSC test

Shivarenjitha and AN Nazeem, the accused in the University College stabbing case.

Thiruvananthapuram: The accused in the recent University College stabbing case likely committed fraud in the Public Service Commission (PSC) exam for the recruitment of civil police officers by using a Chinese smartwatch that enables scanning of printed material. The Cyber Cell of the Kerala Police received information in this regard amid a probe into the exam malpractices of Sivaranjith, Pranav and Naseem, the SFI leaders accused in last month's stabbing of a student on the college campus here last month.

All three have found a place in the PSC rank list by misusing the watch, which works with a SIM card, said officials. The watch has scanning facility, which the accused might have utilised to send the question paper to somebody outside the exam hall as an image, they added. The accomplices are likely to have sent the answers to the watches as messages, the officials believe.

The probe into the fraud has revealed that Gokul, who had sent the messages to Pranav during the time of the exam, is a policeman attached to the Special Armed Police (SAP) camp.

Meanwhile, PSC officials admit that another way the question paper might have leaked was through the last-grade employees at University College. Last-grade staff are tasked with collecting the question papers of candidates who are absent for exams and they could have taken the question paper outside the hall, the officials feel. Based on this suspicion, University College was excluded from the list of PSC exam centres.

While Sivaranjith secured Rank 1 in the PSC rank list for recruitment of police for the Kasaragod-based Kerala Armed Police 4 battalion. Pranav has Rank 2 and Naseem rank 28 in the same PSC test. In the case registered over the stabbing incident, Sivaranjith is accused no: 1, Pranav accused No: 17 and Naseem accused No: 2.

In the PSC exam, Sivaranjith had scored 78.33 marks and Pranav 78.

The watch trick

The Cyber Cell had inspected the call records of the accused based on a request from PSC internal vigilance cell. Cyberexperts feel that a brand of Chinese watch that works with a SIM card may have been used by the accused. Such watches can scan documents with its camera. It may take only a few seconds to scan a question paper.

A PSC question paper has four versions with codes ‘A’ ‘B’ ‘C’ and ‘D’. Cyber experts assume that all the four question papers were leaked by the accused to their accomplices outside the exam hall. The people outside the hall can receive the question paper as WhatsApp or other means. The watch can send messages as images but not receive them in a similar manner. In other words, the watch can receive only SMS messages. Investigators believe that this was why Sivaranjith received 96 messages and Pranav 78 during the exam hours.

The Chinese watches are priced at Rs 5,000 and above.

A massive fraud?

The PSC vigilance cell assumes that a massive exam fraud similar to those happening in other states has taken place. Around 100 candidates had cheated in the civil police exam in various districts, officials estimate.

PSC has prepared seven rank lists for the civil police officer post. It has been decided to the check the phone call records of the first 100 rank holders in each list to unearth the scam.

Gokul, who sent the SMS messages to Pranav during the exam, is a civil police officer. More details are expected only after Crime Branch questions him on taking over the probe. The PSC secretary is expected to write to the DGP seeking a Crime Branch probe as early as possible.

Sivaranjith and Pranav had used the same phone number for one-time registration for the PSC exam and committing the fraud, making detection of the malpractice easy. However, no messages were sent to the phone number given by Naseem for the exam registration during the test. The investigators feel Naseem used another SIM card during the exam. It is also suspected that numerous other candidates had also resorted to the same method. However, they too could be traced by checking call records, say investigators.

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