Report to HC: SIT Detects Lapses in Group-1 Answer Script Evaluation
The SIT said forensic handwriting examination linked chief examiners to unauthorised changes in several scripts.
Vijayawada:The Special Investigation Team has flagged serious procedural lapses, unauthorised alterations and alleged impersonation in the evaluation of answer scripts in the APPSC Group-1 recruitment examination.
This was stated in its final report submitted to the AP High Court recently.
The report was prepared after examining 736 exhibits and 173 witness statements and conducting forensic analysis through seven central forensic science laboratories.
The SIT found that digital evaluation for 2020-21 was introduced without the approval of the then APPSC chairman. It said True Grader Edu Services was engaged without a tender. Evaluation was conducted through private email and Google Drive accounts. The Excel mark sheets also lacked an audit trail, while discrepancies were found between marks entered by evaluators and those in the final database.
On the purported manual evaluation at Haailand, the SIT said answer scripts were kept at a private resort for 84 days.
It noted that data entry operators entered marks derived from the earlier digital evaluation on OMR valuation slips and signed in spaces meant for authorised evaluators. The process involved alleged forgery and impersonation, it said.
White correction fluid was detected on 169 slips.
The evaluation in Vijayawada also revealed alterations. Among the selected candidates, 160 of the 165 slips showed alterations, while alterations were found in 153 of the 161 immediately unselected candidates.
The SIT said forensic handwriting examination linked chief examiners to unauthorised changes in several scripts.
It also found deficiencies in security controls, including the absence of CCTV coverage in the strong room during the initial phase and multiple camera-recorded accesses that were not reflected in registers.
The report noted that 202 candidates shortlisted through digital evaluation did not figure in the manual evaluation shortlist.The SIT however cleared several allegations, including certain barcode mismatches and genuine corrections in totaling.
With seven forensic reports still pending, the SIT called for further investigation into the alleged forgery, impersonation and responsibility for unauthorised alterations. It also flagged internal inconsistencies in some concluding figures and said its legal conclusions were prima facie in nature, and that the investigation remained incomplete.
