The Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) on July 31 cancelled the candidature of probationer Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer Puja Khedkar and she has been debarred permanently from all the future examinations and selections of the Commission.
The UPSC said she was found “guilty of acting in contravention of the provisions of the Civil Services Examination-2022 Rules”.
Regarding submission of false certificates by candidates, specifically those of Other Backward Classes (OBC) and Persons with Benchmark Disabilities (PwBD), the UPSC said it “neither has the mandate nor the wherewithal to check the veracity of thousands of certificates submitted by the candidates every year”.
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Earlier in July, Ms. Khedkar, posted as Assistant Collector in Pune, was transferred to Washim in Maharashtra following complaints of misuse of power by a senior officer. She allegedly demanded special privileges such as a separate office, house, car, and staff, which she was not entitled to. It soon transpired that she allegedly submitted fake PwBD and OBC certificates to clear the civil services exam.
The UPSC said a show-cause notice was issued on July 18 to “Puja Manorama Dilip Khedkar, a provisionally recommended candidate of the CSE-2022, for fraudulently availing attempts beyond the permissible limit provided in the Examination Rules by faking her identity”.
“She was to submit her response by July 25. However, she requested for further time till August 4 so that she could gather the necessary documents for her response. The UPSC carefully considered the request of Ms. Khedkar and in order to meet the ends of justice, she was granted time till 3:30 pm of July 30 to enable her to submit the response. It was also categorically made clear to Ms. Khedkar that it was last and final opportunity to her and no further extension in time would be allowed. It was also conveyed to her in unequivocal terms that if no response was received by the aforesaid date/time, the UPSC would take further action without entertaining any further reference from her. Despite extension in time allowed to her, she failed to submit her explanation within the prescribed time,” UPSC said.
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It further added that in the backdrop of Ms. Khedkar’s case, the UPSC has thoroughly examined the available data of more than 15,000 finally recommended candidates of the CSEs from the year 2009 to 2023, for a period of 15 years with respect to the number of attempts availed by them.
“After this detailed exercise, barring the case of Ms. Khedkar, no other candidate has been found to have availed more number of attempts than permitted under the CSE Rules. In the lone case of Ms. Khedkar, the Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) of the UPSC could not detect her number of attempts primarily due to the fact that she changed not only her name but also her parents’ name. The UPSC is in the process of further strengthening the SOP to ensure that such a case does not recur in the future,” UPSC said.
The UPSC said it only does a preliminary scrutiny of the certificates - whether the certificate has been issued by the competent authority, the year to which the certificate pertains, issuing date of the certificate, whether there is any overwriting on the certificate, format of the certificate, etc. “Generally, the certificate is taken as genuine, if it has been issued by the competent authority. The UPSC neither has the mandate nor the wherewithal to check the veracity of thousands of certificates submitted by the candidates every year. However, it is understood that scrutiny and verification of genuineness of certificates is carried out by the authorities mandated with this task,” it said.
On July 19, the Commission registered a criminal case against Ms Khedkarfor allegedly forging identity papers, and misrepresenting and falsifying facts to obtain extra attempts in civil services examinations. The Delhi Police is investigating the case.
