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An 18-year-old youth has been detained by Pune (Shivajinagar) police for allegedly running a fake board examination question paper leak racket on Telegram and duping students by promising access to SSC and HSC question papers in advance.

The accused, identified as Chaitanya Vinod Shende, a resident of Jatpura in Chandrapur, had created a Telegram group titled “Maharashtra State Board 2026 Papers”. On the group, he claimed that he could provide PDF copies of upcoming Maharashtra State Board examination question papers.

According to police, Shende allegedly fixed the rate of the question papers at Rs 600. He shared a QR code with interested students and asked them to transfer the money through UPI transactions.

The fraud came to light after a complaint was registered at the Shivajinagar police station. During the technical investigation, the police established contact with Telegram through email correspondence to trace the account details linked to the group.

The police officials informed that payments were being routed through UPI IDs including chaitanya03@fam and another ID linked to PhonePe. After verification police confirmed that the account used to receive the money was registered in Shende’s name.

Police said the accused used a clever trick to convince students that he had access to leaked papers. He would upload a PDF file in the Telegram group beforehand and keep it password-protected. After the actual exam was conducted the next day, he would edit the same file and insert the real question paper into it. Since the original upload timestamp remained unchanged, it created the impression that the paper had been uploaded before the exam.

The action was carried out under the guidance of Pune Police Commissioner Amitesh Kumar, Joint Commissioner Ranjan Kumar Sharma, Additional Commissioner Rajesh Bansode, Deputy Commissioner Rishikesh Rawale and Assistant Commissioner Chandrakant Bhosale. The operation was executed by Senior Police Inspector Girishkumar Dighavkar and his team from Shivajinagar police station. 

Rs 600
Rate the victims were charged

Modus operandi?

Shende would upload a PDF file in the Telegram group beforehand and keep it password-protected. After the actual exam was conducted the next day, he would edit the same file and insert the real question paper into it. Since the original upload timestamp remained unchanged, it created the impression that the paper had been uploaded before the exam.