At centre of SSC paper leak scam, Mumbra school was first-time exam centre

The Amboli police have found that several rules regarding conducting of examination have been flouted at the school. (Express photo)

KIDDIES Paradise High School in Mumbra, which is at the centre of the SSC exam paper leak scam, was allotted as an exam centre for the first time last year after another Mumbra-based school that operated as an exam centre opted out. Kiddies Paradise is alleged to be source from where photographs of question papers of five subjects are believed to have been leaked. The Amboli police have found that several rules regarding conducting of examination have been flouted at the school. The principal of the school and her husband have been summoned to the Amboli police station on Monday morning to record their statement.

Subhash Borse, the in-charge secretary of the Mumbai division of the Maharashtra State Board of Secondary and Higher Secondary Education told The Indian Express, “Since the past few years, the Naaz school in Mumbra was the board exam centre and things worked fine. Last year, however, there was some problem because of which they said they could not function as an exam centre. Hence, we had to move the centre to Kiddies Paradise for the first time.”

Meanwhile, the Amboli police that conducted searches at the school have summoned Zakiya Shaikh, the principal of Kiddies Paradise and her husband Mohammed Hussain Shaikh. An officer linked to the probe said the school had flouted several rules concerned with conducting a board exam. “Instead of a staff member of the school, the principal’s husband would go and collect the papers from a custody centre in an autorickshaw. Five invigilators who were appointed at the school were private persons. The school staff does not even have their numbers. It should be checked how this place was appointed as a centre.” Repeated calls to the number listed on the website of the Kiddies Paradise school to get their version went unanswered.

Borse said that before allotting a school as a centre, they check basic things like if the school has enough rooms, benches, number of students that can be accommodated, if it has electricity and a toilet. “Normally, the attached centre would have the staff that would work as invigilators,” Borse said. An officer said, “Depending upon the statements of Zakiya and her husband, we will decide the next course of action. We have also sent the mobile phone recovered to the Forensic Science Laboratory to find out who else shared and received the question papers.”

The Amboli police registered an offence after the question papers of History and Political Science were found on the mobile of eight students on Monday. They had allegedly received the papers through WhatsApp and Instagram. After the completion of paper, the eight students were detained and eventually booked in the case. They were sent to the Children’s home and eventually released on bail. The Amboli police later arrested Firoz Khan (42), a Maths teacher at Kiddies Paradise. Khan ironically had also been arrested in 2013 for leaking SSC exam papers at a Kalyan-based school. He was also arrested in connection with a case of unnatural sex.

Khan is alleged to have opened a sealed packet containing question papers over an hour before the exams and sent picture to Rohit Singh, a teacher at Brilliant Tutorials in Mumbra that was owned by Khan. Singh is believed to have then leaked the papers to students at the classes. After arresting the duo, the police later arrested Anwarul Hasan (21), a Mumbai-based engineering student believed to have also received papers from Khan, and leaked it to students.