In a significant development that could impact thousands of judicial aspirants, the Allahabad High Court has ordered the Uttar Pradesh Public Service Commission (UPPSC) to investigate alleged tampering with answer sheets in the 2022 UP Judicial Service Civil Judge (Junior Division) Mains Examination.
The enquiry was initiated following a plea by a candidate, Shravan Pandey, who contended that his answer sheets for the English and Hindi papers were tampered with. Pandey’s allegations came to light during a hearing before a division bench comprising Justice Siddhartha Varma and Justice Manish Kumar Nigam.
Despite the UPPSC’s failure to produce the answer sheets as previously directed by the court, the commission’s counsel, Advocate Nisheeth Yadav, informed the bench about a broader enquiry into all 18,000 answer sheets from the judiciary exam. This move came after Pandey’s plea highlighted discrepancies in his scores and handwriting inconsistencies.
The court has now directed the UPPSC to submit a comprehensive report of the investigation by July 1, and also to present Pandey’s specific answer sheets at the next hearing. Furthermore, the court issued a stern warning to preserve all examination records until further orders.
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The case began when Pandey, dissatisfied with his exam results published in August 2023, utilized the Right to Information (RTI) Act to investigate the marking scheme. His suspicions intensified after viewing his answer sheets on May 25, where he noticed clear discrepancies in handwriting and the inexplicable scoring off of answers in his Hindi paper.
