Hyderabad: State Tells Universities To Cancel Coempt Contracts

The action was taken after reports suggested that Coempt — in its previous avatar as Globarena Technologies Private Limited — had allegedly defrauded JNTUK Kakinada of ₹26 crore in a contract that became a criminal case, which is pending at the Andhra Pradesh High Court.

"Notices regarding suppression of the pending criminal case have been issued, and institutions have been alerted," said TGCHE chairman Prof. V. Balakista Reddy. "We have received information on the matter and are being careful and vigilant. Wherever such issues are brought to our notice, we are making efforts to examine them and ensure that appropriate precautions are taken."

Prof. Balakista Reddy said the TGCHE had directed the Kaloji Narayana Rao University of Health Sciences to exempt Coempt from its active contract. "Ultimately, the decision rests with the universities and colleges concerned, but TGCHE will communicate the available information and caution them accordingly," he said.

In February, Kannur University in Kerala had disqualified Coempt from a separate tender for concealing the JNTUK case in its declaration. Though the company has acknowledged the matter in a written submission, Coempt said the matter was "technically shown as pending."

"If there is fraud, such entities cannot be allowed to continue indefinitely. Legal notices and proceedings may take time, but universities are being advised to avoid awarding any future tenders to such firms. If wrongdoing is established, they could also be liable for criminal action," Prof. Balakista Reddy said.

According to B. Pullaiah, secretary of the Telangana Board of Technical Education and Training (SBTET), his institution had disqualified the company.

Coempt, however, has been using an arbitration award as evidence that courts have cleared its name from the criminal case.

Explaining Coempt’s rationale, Dr P.B. Vijaya Kumar, JNTUK's legal counsel in the arbitration proceedings, told Deccan Chronicle that the arbitrator had passed the award without giving JNTUK notice.

JNTUK then filed a petition under Section 34 of the Arbitration and Conciliation Act to set aside the award because it was passed without a valid extension of time, without notice, and reportedly contrary to the arbitrator's own recorded commitment. "Though an award is passed in their favour, it has become inexecutable now," he said.

Coempt's director V.S.N. Raju, however, disputed this JNTUK understanding of the arbitration award, stating, "It is not inexecutable. It is active.” He said JNTUK challenging the award was the normal course of action after losing an arbitration.
The company's broader argument that courts have cleared it rested on three sets of documents that its director Raju sent Deccan Chronicle. The first was a performance certificate from JNTU Hyderabad dated November 2014, praising a different e-learning project that Globarena executed there, and a review report from August 2015 in which a committee of professors from IIT Madras, IIT Hyderabad, and Anna University found that Globarena's work on that JNTUH project was "quite close to the stated objectives."

The second was the Telangana High Court's order dismissing a public interest litigation about the 2019 Intermediate results crisis, and the Supreme Court's order dismissing an appeal. The third was a screenshot from the AP Police FIR portal showing the FIR's case status as being of "civil nature."

However, each document relates to a proceeding or institution separate from the criminal case filed by JNTUK Kakinada. The JNTUH performance certificate and the IIT committee review concern a different university and a different project from the contract on which the JNTUK FIR is based.

In its dismissal of the PIL, the Telangana High Court stated that it was leaving the question of criminal proceedings to the state government to decide and expressly refrained from expressing any opinion on the matter. The AP Police portal screenshot showing "civil nature" carries on the same screen the text "FIR Confirmed and Investigation in process."

The FIR was registered under Sections 406 and 420 of the Indian Penal Code, both non-bailable criminal offences. The petition Globarena filed at the AP High Court to quash the FIR was registered as a criminal petition under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, and its status on the court registry remains pending.

The FIR has not been investigated. Dr Vijaya Kumar confirmed this directly. "The moment the FIR was filed by the registrar, they immediately approached the High Court. The High Court only said not to make an arrest."

No chargesheet has been filed.

Prof. V.V. Subba Rao, former registrar of JNTUK Kakinada, whose complaint became the basis for FIR No. 26 of 2019, is now Vice Chancellor of JNTU-GV, Vizianagaram. He confirmed to Deccan Chronicle that the MoU between JNTUK and Globarena and the September 2014 experience certificate, which named Magnetic Infotech as a consortium partner and carried the signature of Magnetic Infotech's director, were authentic documents.

The certificate — issued by JNTUK's director of evaluation Dr Ch. Sai Babu, on September 8, 2014 — confirmed that Globarena Technologies, Magnetic Infotech, and DRS Data Services of the United Kingdom jointly processed 13,23,822 answer scripts for JNTUK during the academic year 2013-14. The certificate became the proof of prior experience, and both companies used to qualify for examination contracts at institutions across India.