Fake certificates: A pre-Independence practice

While hundreds of thousands of teachers were recruited in Bihar in recent years, the Bihar Vigilance Police has now discovered that 40,000 of these appointments were based on fake certificates. FIRs have been registered, legal proceedings have begun, and the salaries paid to them will be recovered. However, securing government jobs using forged documents in Bihar is a practice that dates back to the British era.

Arun Kumar Upadhyay—a resident of Bhojpur district, a graduate of Patna Science College, and a retired 1976-batch IPS officer who served as the Director General of Police (DGP) in Odisha—claims that such activities were prevalent even under British rule.

Upadhyay shared two major examples of fake certificates he witnessed:

"My uncle, Vidyadhar Upadhyay, obtained forged degrees for Matriculation, Intermediate (IA), and Graduation (BA) before Independence. He even became the Headmaster of Basic High School in Agiaon (Bhojpur). He never actually taught a class. Instead, he would deliver fruits and vegetables to Education Department officials, most of which he stole from the village fields and orchards before sunrise."

Upadhyay noted that his uncle could never correctly spell his own name, "Vidyadhar," throughout his life, writing it variously as Bidadhar, Biddadhar, Bidedhar, or Beedadhar.

Arun Kumar Upadhyay himself was a victim of the fake certificate racket. He recalls that while he was a student at Patna Science College, the Vice-Chancellor of Patna University, Mahendra Pratap, and his agent, Bageshwari Nath Sahay, were running a paper-leak racket. When Upadhyay protested, the Vice-Chancellor went on a "vow of silence." Upadhyay had to answer to the press, and according to Mahendra Pratap, his statements were broadcast that night on the Hindi news segments of the BBC and Peking Radio.

"After I had received a National Scholarship for four years, these people had my Matriculation results cancelled. However, I had already secured admission into Pre-Science, B.Sc. Part 1, and B.Sc. Part 2 at the same university based on a provisional certificate. Due to the international publicity surrounding this case, I was allowed to sit for the Indian Forest Service (IFS) exam in 1973 based solely on my +2 marksheet after I sent a request via postcard. I stood first in the written examination."

Arun served as an IFS officer in the Punjab cadre for two years before joining the IPS and moving to Odisha. He mentioned that because he was technically marked as "failed" in his B.Sc. due to the dispute, he received the lowest marks in every interview, as recruiters suspected his results were forged.

A Matriculation certificate was mandatory for his appointment. While the clerks at the Bihar School Examination Board were willing to process his papers, the Chairman—a senior IAS officer named S.C. Hansda—refused to work without a bribe of 50 rupees.

The clerks informed Upadhyay that 50 rupees was the standard "rate" Hansda charged for each of the 40,000 fake certificates he issued. Even though Upadhyay's certificate was genuine, the bribe was still demanded.

Through his struggle, and a reprimand from the then Panchayati Raj Minister, Mr. Shyamacharan Tubid (father of Jharkhand’s Home Secretary and father-in-law of Chief Secretary Rajbala Verma), the Chairman's stenographer and other officials were moved to help. They provided Upadhyay with documents against Hansda that he initially did not understand.

The stenographer provided a fake income certificate that Hansda had created to secure a scholarship for his son. Despite earning a monthly salary of 3,000 rupees as a Secretary-level officer, Hansda had a Tehsildar certify his annual income as only 2,700 rupees. Upadhyay took this evidence to the nearby Budh Marg Police Station.

"An elderly Sub-Inspector was delighted and said he had never seen such a foolproof case in his life, but admitted it was impossible for him to file a case against a senior IAS officer. Therefore, I made many photocopies—using the large cameras of that era—and sent them to the governments of Bihar and India. I signed the documents without even reading them."

"I don't know if he went to jail for that specific case or for the 40,000 fake certificates scam. But it was only after he went to jail that I finally received my Matriculation certificate in 1975—nine years after the examination. In today's climate, I probably would never have received it."