The NM Joshi Marg police has arrested a 22-year-old man who was appearing on behalf of his relative as a candidate for a police recruitment examination on Sunday. The police has also arrested the real candidate who was waiting just outside the examination centre. Preliminary probe has revealed that the faces of both the accused are a bit similar and so they decided to con the examiner.
The arrested accused have been identified as Kisan Karbhari Dhomal (22) and Pawan Fakirchand Bhahure (20). “Both were arrested under Section 419 (cheating by impersonation), 420 (cheating) and 34 (common intention) of the Indian Penal Code,” said Sudhakar Ghagare, senior inspector of NM Joshi Marg police station.
According to the police, Dhomal had applied to the Police Bharti Examinations 2013 for the post of constable. He had undergone the physical fitness examinations and was supposed to clear the written examination of the General Knowledge paper scheduled for Sunday. The examinations were carried out in various schools across the city.
One of the examination centres was Holy Cross School located at Elphinstone Road. “When the candidates were coming out of the examination hall after finishing their paper, one of the candidates approached us and pointed towards a candidate and raised suspicion that he might be a dummy candidate. We questioned the man and it turned out that he was a dummy candidate. His real name was Pawan Bhahure and had just given the exam on someone else’s behalf,” said PI Ramesh Shinde, who was also the nodal officer for the examination at that centre.
Mr Shinde added that the dummy’s face was a bit similar to the photo on the hall ticket, but when he was asked to produce his signature on paper, we found it to be different from that on the hall ticket. Bhahure was then searched and we found a piece of paper with a cellphone number written on it. We made a phone call on that number and asked that person to come to the school. That man was a friend of Bhahure who identified him.
Bhahure then gave the investigators the cellphone number of the real candidate Dhomal, who was waiting just outside the school. Both of them were then taken to the police station and put under arrest.
Bhahure and Dhomal are related and hail from the same village. “Since both have almost similar faces and Bhahure was smarter than Dhomal, Dhomal requested him to help him out with the written exam. Bhahure agreed to help him and even gave the exam on behalf of him, but ran out of the luck,” said Mr Shinde, adding that they would be produced in the court on Monday.