Bandi Sanjay Prime Accused In SSC Question Paper Leak, Arrested

Telangana BJP president Bandi Sanjay Kumar has turned out to be the principal accused in the leak of the Hindi question paper of the ongoing SSC exams in the State.

The Warangal police arrested Sanjay in the case today.

Warangal Commissioner of Police Ranganath confirmed the arrest of Sanjay.

Addressing media persons, the CP said that Bandi Sanjay was the A1 in the case.

The CP said that a former journalist Bura Prashanth, a lab assistant of Kakatiya Medical College G Mahesh, a Siva Ganesh and a minor boy were also arrested in the case.

He said that four other accused were at large.

The arrested were all shifted to a court, and sections 120 (B), 420, 447 and 505 of the IPC invoked against them, Ranganath said.

The CP added that the officials of the education department had already taken action against the officials who had shown negligence in conducting the exam at the Kamalapur ZPHS where the leak originated.

He also added that the police did not book cases against all those who had received the question paper on their phones.

Giving details of the incident, the CP said that a journalist had forwarded the question paper to his media heads at 11:18 am, and that the A2 in the case Bura Prashanth had forwarded the paper to Bandi Sanjay Kumar at 11:20 am.

He said that Prashanth had forwarded the question paper to some other persons, too, including BJP MLA Eatala Rajender, the latter's PA Raju and a couple of other BJP leaders.

Ranganath said that they had arrested Sanjay based on the developments that took place a day before the exam. He said that a WhatsApp chat had happened between Sanjay and Prashanth on the evening of April 3, 2023, and that Sanjay had made the same comments at a press conference later as Prashanth had told him in the WhatsApp chat.

The CP also said Sanjay did not surrender his mobile phone to them, and that scrutiny of the phone would bring important information to the fore in the case. He alleged that Sanjay was not handing over his phone as he was scared of the exposure of the important information to the world.

The CP said that the police would nevertheless gather the call data of Sanjay.