The arrested people included Muna Mohanty, his aide Srikant Moharana, Soumya Priyadarshini Samal, and Abhimanyu Dora. File
| Photo Credit: Special Arrangement
The Crime Branch of the Odisha Police has arrested four persons in connection with a massive recruitment scam, that used its network to rig the process and help aspirants secure jobs as sub-inspectors.
“We have arrested four individuals for their involvement in the recruitment scam. They were helping job seekers practice selected question sets intensively at remote locations at Vizianagaram in Andhra Pradesh and Digha in West Bengal,” said Vinaytosha Mishra, Additional Director General of Police (Crime Branch), on Friday.
The matter came to light when Berhampur police arrested 114 aspirants while they were being taken on buses to Andhra Pradesh to obtain leaked question papers for the upcoming Combined Police Service Examination (CPSE) 2024.
Leaked papers
The arrested people included Muna Mohanty, his aide Srikant Moharana, Soumya Priyadarshini Samal, and Abhimanyu Dora.
“Muna Mohanty was the key accused who provided transport to aspirants for travel to Vizianagaram, while Arbind Das, who was arrested earlier, was responsible for providing selective questions and arranging practice in Digha. They were both reporting to the main accused, Shankar Prusty, who was operating from New Delhi,” Mr. Mishra revealed.
The advertisement for the CPSE 2024, aimed at recruiting 933 sub-inspectors of police, was issued in January 2025. According to sources, the Central Public Sector Enterprise, Indian Telephone Industries Limited (ITI), was entrusted with conducting the examination. ITI initially partnered with Gujarat-based Richminds Digital Private Limited for the assignment, but later terminated the agreement and brought in Odisha-based Silicon Digitech as its new partner.
Manipulate recruitment
Silicon Digitech subsequently subcontracted the work to an inexperienced Berhampur-based firm, Panchsoft Technologies. Panchsoft, headed by the main accused, Prusty, allegedly collected large sums of money to manipulate the recruitment process.
The Crime Branch DG said arrangements were made to coach 110 aspirants in Digha, for which ₹35,000 each was paid to a hotel.
“We are still working on cracking the scam fully. We have seized 110 mobile phones. After the bus was detained, all aspirants were asked to delete their WhatsApp chats. We are in the process of retrieving chats through forensic examinations,” he said.
The Crime Branch said the same set of accused persons might be involved in other recruitment scams. The main accused, Shankar Prusty’s, extremely affluent lifestyle at a young age was definitely suspicious, investigators said.
Published – October 18, 2025 04:46 am IST
