SHILLONG, July 10: The trial of the alleged scam in the Education department, in which the then Education Minister Ampareen Lyngdoh was charge-sheeted, has been affected by Covid-19.
Sources from the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) said the agency would request the court to expedite the process. The trial was going on in the court of a district judge in the city.
Former Central Minister and senior Supreme Court lawyer, Salman Khurshid had represented Lyngdoh in the court earlier this year.
The case is said to be in the “charge-framing” stage now. The CBI sources said it might take a long time for the court to pronounce the verdict.
“The CBI has done its job and the matter is now in the court,” the sources said.
The CBI had filed the charge-sheet against retired officials of the Education department JD Sangma and AI Lyngdoh besides the former minister, now a Congress MLA.
The allegation against Lyngdoh was that she had instructed Sangma and two of her supporters to tamper with and forge the score sheets by applying white fluid.
The High Court of Meghalaya had on November 2, 2016 ordered the CBI to probe the criminal aspect of the scam.
The task was to investigate the alleged manipulation of score sheets and interference in the selection of assistant teachers in lower primary schools during 2008-09.
Based on the court’s order, the CBI had registered an FIR under various Sections of IPC related to criminal conspiracy, forgery and criminal breach of trust against the accused.
Recently, the Education department reinstated the services of 187 assistant teachers of lower primary schools after it was found that they were not involved in the scam.
An official from the Education department said a three-member committee cleared them and the department went by it.
The committee was set up by the department in deference to an order by the High Court on a review petition filed by these teachers.
Altogether 506 lower primary school teachers were terminated from service due to alleged irregularities in their appointment.
Based on the first CBI report, the Education department had terminated the services of 246 teachers. And after the agency had come up with the second report, another 260 teachers were terminated.
