Summary:
SHIMLA: Shimla police on Saturday registered an FIR in the Rs 210 crore Scholarship scam of Himachal Pradesh The case has been registered under the provisions of cheating, forgery, forgery of records and using forged documents as genuine against two prominent private educational institutions of Karnataka and Punjab. A large number of institutions were located outside the state so the state government took the decision to conduct a detailed probe to bring out the truth. This decision was taken after many irregularities came to light during the meeting held to review the scholarship distribution during the previous Congress regime.It was found that some institutions unexpectedly had a large number of students enrolled and preliminary inquiry revealed that different institutions of state and centre were involved in this. During the departmental probe, it had come to light that around 70 per cent institutions availing the scholarship benefits belonged from outside the state.State government already has decided to hand over the probe to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and with police registering the FIR now the case would soon be handed over to CBI.Chief minister Jai Ram Thakur led BJP government on August 21 this year had taken the decision to hand over the investigation of scholarship scam to CBI. It has been alleged in the complaint that these institutes usurped scholarship of 250 students from Kangra district State Project Officer (SPM & NIU), Shakti Bhushan in his complaint alleged that Secretary (Education Department), Himachal Pradesh, had appointed him for the enquiry of allotment of scholarship and during the enquiry, he found that 250 students of Kangra district had taken admission in Fathepur and Vadukhar centres of two private universities of Karnataka and Punjab.He said that at the time of filling of forms, the management of the universities declared to provide a scholarship to the students of SC/ST category, which had transferred to their Aadhaar-based linked account..