Thiruvananthapuram: Investigation centred around the alleged cheating and examination malpractice amid a recruitment test, for technical staff vacancies at Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre (VSSC), revealed that 469 Haryana natives had arrived to attend the examination across various centres and majority of them were impersonating actual candidates. 

If the impersonators pass the written examination, then the actual candidates will appear for the interview and enter jobs. The lack of clarity of the candidates’ photographs on hall tickets proved to be an added advantage for the candidates, Museum police said. 

Those who enter the exam centres are provided with the fake Aadhaar cards and other identity proofs of the actual candidates. Coaching centres in Haryana charge around lakhs to arrange impersonators to write exams and forge fake identity documents, the accused told the police. 

Meanwhile, the police will soon demand the VSSC to hand over all the documents uploaded by all the north Indians, who attended the exam the other day. The move is aimed to clarify the real identities of the applicants. 

The police are of the view that the impersonators are not well versed in technical matters and were assisted by those outside the examination centre. It is learnt that button cameras were used to scan the questions which were sent to someone elsewhere using the mobile phones. Thereafter, the answers were received through small listening devices placed inside the ears of the candidates (impersonators).

As per reports, a competition among coaching centres in Haryana led to the leakage of the information. Earlier, a similar cheating case was reported in the PSC police constable recruitment in the northern districts of Kerala. Although the probe was completed, the accused have not yet been convicted in the case. 

The national-level recruitment test was held only in Kerala at 10 centres across the state, police added.