Photographs of candidates, who were engaged as impersonators in the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET), have been sent to the Medical Council of India (MCI) to verify if they were students of any medical college in the country.
In September this year, the case of a student gaining admission to MBBS at the Government Theni Medical College by engaging an impersonator to clear NEET marked the beginning of a scam in the State. So far, the CB-CID, which is probing the NEET impersonation case, has arrested 12 persons — seven students and their parents. An intermediary (broker) was also arrested, while they are on the lookout for another intermediary, official sources said.
“The CB-CID police has sent a letter along with photographs of candidates, who impersonated in NEET, to MCI. Except for their photographs, we have no names and addresses of these candidates. So, the MCI should verify if these candidates are studying in undergraduate or postgraduate medical courses in any medical college in the country. This is because these candidates have cleared NEET,” an official said. MCI has to send these photographs to colleges to identify if these students were studying at the institutions.
The focus has turned on the impersonators as the police have nabbed almost all students and their parents involved in the case, he said. Most of the impersonators had appeared for the examination in NEET centres outside Tamil Nadu.
PG NEET list
In another development, the CB-CID has sought a list of candidates, who had appeared for NEET PG in the last two years from the Directorate of Medical Education. While the directorate is preparing the list, officials said the police as of now did not suspect impersonation. “The list was sought from the investigation point of view,” the official said.
The NEET scam began with an email sent to the dean of the Government Theni Medical College alleging that a first year MBBS student had cleared the exam by engaging an impersonator and gained admission. The photograph of the candidate in the NEET documents that were submitted to the college at the time of admission did not match with the student. This led to the arrest of the student and his father, who was a doctor at the Government Stanley Medical College Hospital. Investigation revealed the involvement of more number of students studying in government and private medical colleges, and their parents.
