Cuttack: Cyber police in Cuttack on Sunday arrested five individuals — four YouTubers and a govt school teacher — for their alleged involvement in leaking question papers of half-yearly examinations of classes VIII to X of state-run schools in 2024.
The arrested individuals have been identified as Jyotiranjan Barik, Sushant Kumar Bishi, Sahil Kumar Mishra, Saishankar Patra (YouTube channel owners), and Ghanshyam Behera, a teacher from Rairangpur in Mayurbhanj district.
Police said the accused leaked question papers of school exams for classes VIII to X and sold them through digital platforms.
The issue came to light when Ranjan Kumar Dash, secretary of Odisha Secondary School Teachers’ Association (OSSTA), lodged an FIR on Nov 1, 2024, after finding question papers had been leaked during the half-yearly exams.
Police seized seven mobile phones, a tablet and multiple question papers from the accused.
Cuttack DCP Jagmohan Meena said, “Getting a response from YouTube is a time-consuming process, but the police launched a swift probe following the complaint. The accused belong to different parts of Odisha, which made the operation slightly time-consuming, but we managed to arrest them all.”
Police are now conducting further investigations to find out if more individuals are involved in the racket and to assess the full extent of the paper leak.