By Shankar Prasad Khanal | Nepalgunj
Around midnight on June 3, the police caught seven people red-handed with what turned out to be Rs 3.8 million in bribe money in Hotel Batika in Nepalgunj. Those arrested had taken bribes from Nepali applicants to the Indian army by promising them recruitment, and had leaked question papers of the qualifying exams.Nepali citizens who have passed the Secondary Education Examination and are between the ages of 17.5 and 21 are eligible to apply for the Indian army. Many Nepalis apply, as the job offers a lucrative monthly salary of around Rs 50,000.
Currently, there are 42,000 Nepalis serving in the Indian army. Depending on the need, the recruitment process takes place once or twice a year at five centers in Nepal—Nepalgunj and Butwal in Province 5, Pokhara in Province 4, Chitwan in Province 3, and Dharan in Province 1.
This year in Nepalgunj, 896 applicants sat for a written examination between May 30 and June 4, and 447 of them cleared it. Even though one of the exams was going to be held on the morning of June 4, between 400 to 500 people were seen at Hotel Batika the previous midnight, which raised suspicion.
When the police raided the hotel, they found 85 mobile phone sets besides the Rs 3.8 million in cash in the possession of the seven arrestees. It is suspected that on an average an applicant paid Rs 200,000 in bribe; others might have paid as much as Rs 500,000.
Even if each of the 447 applicants who cleared the exam gave Rs 300,000 in bribe, the total amount would exceed Rs 130 million. “It seems the target was to raise Rs 100 million that night. We could not catch some culprits because they ran away,” says Bhim Rana, an eye-witness and Banke district chairman of Nepal Retired Sainik Committee. The incident has revealed the extent of the fraud in the Indian army recruitment process.
Rana says, “People pay between Rs 100,000 to Rs 500,000 for a leaked question paper. An additional Rs 500,000 is asked from applicants if they clear the medical entrance exam at Gorakhpur, India. Some applicants and their parents have revealed that getting recruited to the Indian army costs at least Rs 800,000. Fraud of such a scale is not possible without the involvement of a criminal ring.”
Training centers for Indian army recruitment have opened up in several cities of Nepal. Many have investments from retired Indian army personnel. The police have informed that of the seven people who have been arrested, five are retired Indian army officers who were running such training centers. Nepal Retired Sainik Committee suspected irregularities last year, but could not catch anyone red-handed.
Spokesperson for the district police office DSP Prakash Sapkota says, “Those who were involved in calling the applicants to Hotel Batika to receive the leaked question paper in return for bribes are now under investigation.”
The committee organized a press conference on June 8 in Nepalgunj, in which it accused the police of investigating the matter slowly and even trying to protect the guilty.
