Gandhinagar:  Gujarat Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS) on Thursday, arrested 30 people for allegedly buying the leaked question paper of the state’s junior clerk recruitment exam, which was cancelled hours before it was supposed to take place on January 29.

This brings the total number of accused in the paper leak case to 49. Earlier, 19 people, including agents and middlemen, were arrested after the leak was detected in January and they remain in custody. During a raid on a computer center in Vadodara in January, the call letters, blank cheques and original documents of these 30 candidates, including seven women, were seized, and they were placed under arrest on Thursday after a probe and verification.

According to Gujarat ATS DySP S L Chaudhary, these 30 people had agreed to pay between Rs 12 lakh and Rs 15 lakh to those involved in the paper leak, and the blank cheques and original certificates were submitted as “guarantees.” The majority of these candidates come from northern and central Gujarat districts, such as Mehsana, Aravalli, Kheda, Dahod, Sabarkantha, Gandhinagar, Chhota Udepur, and Mahisagar. Nineteen of the 30 candidates were from the central Gujarat districts of Dahod, Chhota Udepur, Mahisagar, and Kheda.

The exams were being conducted by the Gujarat Panchayat Service Commission to recruit 1,181 junior clerks, and 9.53 lakh candidates were scheduled to appear for the exams on January 29. DeshGujarat