The CBI has claimed that Chhattisgarh Public Service Commission ex-chairman Taman Singh Sonwani tweaked guidelines and shared the CGPSC-2021 exam question papers with his two nephews in advance, facilitating their selection to the state services.
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on January 16 filed its first chargesheet in the alleged CGPSC scam, which came to light during the previous Congress regime, before a special court in Raipur, naming Sonwani and six others.
The other accused persons are Sonwani’s nephews Nitesh Sonwani and Sahil Sonwani, then CGPSC deputy controller examination Lalit Ganvir, director of Shri Bajrang Power and Ispat Ltd Shravan Kumar Goyal, his son Shashank Goyal and daughter-in-law Bhumika Katiyar.
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All seven have been arrested.
The central agency in April last year took over the probe into two cases registered in the state over alleged favouritism in the selection of deputy collectors, deputy superintendents of police and other senior government posts through CGPSC exams during the 2020-2022 period.
As per the CBI chargesheet, Taman Singh Sonwani in a meeting dated July 14, 2021, replaced the word ‘relative’ with ‘family’ in the guidelines and modified the definition of ‘family’ to exclude the word ‘nephew’ to help his nephews who were to take the CGPSC 2021 exam.
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As per the exam guidelines, if any close relative or family member of the chairman and members of CGPSC take the exam, the functionaries would keep themselves away from the selection process.
On November 16, 2021, the advertisement for the CGPSC 2021 examination was published to fill up 171 posts in various categories. The recruitment body received applications from 1,29,206 candidates.
That year, Arun Diwedi of M/s AKD Printers Pvt. Ltd, which was contracted to set the question papers and do the moderation of question papers, was instructed by Arti Wasnik, the then controller of examination of the hiring body to set up two question papers for the prelims of the CGPSC State Civil Services Exam, the chargesheet said.
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AKD Printers prepared the final drafts of both question papers and sent them in a sealed envelope to Wasnik for review. These were despatched through a special messenger of the firm, Mahesh Das, in January 2022, according to the CBI.
Later, Das collected a sealed envelope from the Wasnik’s residence, where another person, later identified as Taman Singh Sonwani, was present. Das proceeded to Kolkata and passed on the envelope, containing the question papers for CGPSC 2021 prelims, duly approved by Wasnik in consultation with Sonwani, to Diwedi, the chargesheet said.
Citing its probe, CBI claimed that Wasnik and Sonwani knew the questions that were supposed to be asked in the exam, which was scheduled on February 13, 2022, it said.
A similar method was adopted for the mains examination held between May 26 and 29, 2022. The results of mains examination were declared on August 22, 2022, wherein 509 candidates qualified.
After interviews, the final result was declared on May 11, 2023, showing the selection of 170 candidates for different posts. Shashank Goyal, his wife Bhumika Katiyar and Nitesh were selected as deputy collectors, while Sahil got the post of deputy superintendent of police (DSP).
The CBI chargesheet alleges that Taman Singh Sonwani “misused” his official position and shared the question papers with his nephews Nitesh and Sahil before the exams. Further, Sonwani and Ganvir colluded with Shravan Kumar Goyal, a whole-time director of Shri Bajrang Power and Ispat Ltd, to send the question papers to his son Shashank and daughter-in-law Bhumika.
The chargesheet said a non-government organisation (NGO) named Gramin Vikas Samiti (GVS) controlled by Sonwani’s family collected ₹45 lakh from Goyal’s firm as kickbacks over the sharing of the question papers.
The central agency said that GVS-Jeejamgaon, wherein Sonwani was a member and Ganvir was the treasurer, sought ₹50 lakh from Bajrang Power and Ispat under Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) for “construction/extension of a Kala Mahavidhyalaya (college)” operated by the NGO.
Shravan Kumar Goyal, a member of the CSR committee of the firm, misguided the other members and got recommendations for sanctioning ₹20 lakh and ₹25 lakh (in two installments) to GVS. The money was transferred to the bank account of GVS on March 2, 2022, and May 18, 2022, it said.
The CBI has claimed that Goyal was well aware that CSR funds could not be released for the construction/extension of a college as this was not included in the activities mentioned in Schedule VII, Section 135, of the Companies Act, 2013.
The CBI chargesheet also said that the investigation concerning a few allegations in FIR is pending, including the probe into the selection of other candidates as deputy collectors and other posts following the CGPSC 2021 examination, Wasnik’s role, alleged malpractices in the recruitment of assistant professor (one of the allegations in the FIR other than CGPSC 2021 exam).
