SSC paper leak: Chairman recommends CBI probe as thousands protest in Delhi

Giving in to the demands of hundreds of job aspirants, the Staff Selection Commission Chairman on Sunday said he will request the department to reconduct the SSC examination and also request the CBI to launch a probe into the matter.

The standoff started after a weeklong demonstration by hundreds of job aspirants who picketed outside the Staff Selection Commission's (SSC) office, housed in CGO Complex at Lodhi Raod.

The SSC Chairman Ashim Khurana met a delegation of protesters on Sunday, reportedly after the intervention of Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh, who ordered the commission to act on the demands of the protesters.

 

The job aspirants are protesting over an alleged paper leak which came to light during the exams on February 21. They are demanding that the exams should be reconducted and a probe be conducted by the top investigation agency.

Various leaders have openly supported the aspirants during their protest, asking the government to intervene. Social activist Anna Hazare, Congress Leader Shashi Tharoor and Delhi BJP leader Manoj Tiwari are a few of the people who came to meet the aspirants at their protest site.

"The Commission after having heard the delegation agreed for recommending to the Department of Personnel and Training to request the Government to conduct a CBI enquiry into all the allegations pertaining to conduct of CGL (Tier-II) Examination 2017 held from February 17 to February 22, 2018 including alleged leakage of questions, if any, alleged deficiencies observed in the conduct of the examinations by the service provider, if any, and other related issues.

"It was also agreed that all evidences of examination related malpractices submitted by the protesting candidates, including the screenshots of the questions taken during the examination from February 17 to February 22, 2018, will be handed over to the CBI for enquiry," read the Chairman's note.

However, the job aspirants have refused to disperse, demanding a more "unambiguous" directive from the government into the matter.

"This is just a tactic of the government to divert the attention and disperse the crowd. The Chairman is even now only 'requesting' a CBI probe and 'requesting' for re-examination, whereas he should be ordering for both unequivocally," Umesh Yadav, one of the protesters, told IANS over the phone.

"Chairman has tried to deceive again, He is not addressing the issues the way we demanded... We will not stop the protest. It continues," he said.