Guwahati : A candidate of Assam’s Joint Entrance Exam-Mains 2020, Neel Nakshatra Das, his doctor father, Dr Jyotirmoy Das and three others were arrested by the city police here on Thursday on charges of using a proxy to write the country’s premier engineering entrance test. The accused had succeeded in securing 99.8 percent in the exam and topped among candidates from Assam.

Police said that the other three arrested persons – Hamendra Nath Sarma, Pranjal Kalita and Hirulal Pathak are employees of a testing centre.

“An FIR (first information report) has been registered with the Azara Police in Assam against the candidate of the Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) Mains in Assam, allegedly for using a proxy to appear in the examination on his behalf. We investigated the case and have unearthed that a proxy was used by the candidate through the help of another agency that acted as a middleman,” Guwahati Police Commissioner MP Gupta told reporters.

The entire racket came to light after a phone call recording and WhatsApp chat went viral on social media in which the accused allegedly spoke about having used unfair means to top the exam.

Referring to the social media post, a complaint was lodged by one Mr. Mitradev Sharma on October 23 at the city’s Azara police station alleging that the candidate did not appear for the test held on September 5.