An IAS officer from the 2019 batch named Naveen Tanwar was suspended on Friday, April 5, for allegedly appearing in the 2014 Institute of Banking Personnel Selection (IBPS) clerk recruitment exam on Amit Singh's behalf from Jhansi. Tanwar was employed by the District Rural Development Agency (DRDA) in Chamba, Himachal Pradesh, as the Project Director and Additional Deputy Commissioner at the time of suspension.
Tanwar was given a three-year prison sentence earlier in March by Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) Judicial Magistrate Shivam Verma. This was followed by the suspension. Tanwar was also fined Rs. 50,000, but the CBI court granted him bail, allowing him to be released from custody. Any employee or officer who stays in jail for more than 48 hours is automatically suspended, according to the Law Department.
Going back to December 13, 2014, Tanwar, an IBPS clerk recruitment exam taker from Noida, Uttar Pradesh, took the exam at the Ideal Institute of Technology in Ghaziabad under the guise of Amit Singh. Tanwar was one of six people accused by the CBI of being part of a "solver gang." Exam-taking on behalf of other candidates was the gang's speciality.
Tanwar had taken the test for Amit Singh, while Sawan Kumar, another accused, had shown up for Ajay Pal Singh, it was discovered during the investigation. At the examination centre, the CBI detained Tanwar and Kumar. The intermediaries Hanumat and Sugriv Gurjar, who had assisted in the impersonation, were also taken into custody. Afterwards, bail was obtained for each of the accused.
Tanwar was questioned and probed concerning his role in the fraud in 2019 during a court proceeding. Tanwar carried on with his civil services career until his recent suspension, despite the ongoing case. Tanwar had emailed for a 14-day leave of absence on March 24, but the state government had only given him a seven-day leave. His suspension was imposed after his sentencing, underscoring the grave repercussions of such dishonest acts in government hiring procedures.
Correction at 6:23 PM on July 5: This report earlier carried misstatements about Mr. Naveen Tanwar. Mr. Tanwar is described as a postgraduate in Geography, UGC NET JRF qualified, and a UPSC Educator who worked with UNACADEMY from August 2020 to April 2023, and from May 2023 to July 2023. He has reportedly helped many students crack several competitive exams. The mistake was unintentional. The error is regretted
