Indian state seeks new ‘scam probe’

NEW DELHI: The embattled chief minister of India’s Madhya Pradesh state on Tuesday asked federal investigators to carry out an independent probe into a jobs scandal after a spate of deaths which opponents have linked to the scam.
Nearly 2,000 people have been arrested since 2013 over the so-called Vyapam scandal in which thousands of people are alleged to have paid bribes in return for jobs on the state payroll or for places in educational institutes.
But opponents of the Madhaya Pradesh state government, run by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), say the scandal is even more wideranging and goes right to the top of the administration.
The sudden death of a television journalist at the weekend while reporting on the scandal has fuelled allegations of a mass conspiracy that have been widely reported by Indian newspapers and broadcasters.
Some reports say dozens of people linked to the scandal — whether as suspects in the inquiry or else as witnesses or investigators — have died in the last few years.
While there is little evidence to connect any of the deaths or to suggest foul play, the main opposition Congress has accused Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan of direct involvement in the scandal from his time as state education minister and demanded his resignation.
Chauhan had previously tried to fend off the accusations, saying that an ongoing inquiry by state investigators would get to the bottom of the allegations and there was no need for a federal probe.
But he was forced into a u-turn on Tuesday amid the growing media frenzy in the wake of the death of the TV reporter Akshay Singh and made a formal request for the Central Bureau of Investigation — India’s top federal investigation agency — to take up the case.
“Honouring public sentiments, I will request the High Court to order a CBI probe. Democracy is run on public acceptability,” Chauhan told reporters at a press conference in the state capital Bhopal.