New Delhi: Police in Bihar have arrested around 1,000 aspiring constables for using "middlemen" to sit their exams for them, in the latest cheating scandal to hit the state, an official said on Monday.
Some 50,000 candidates sat the written exams last October for a highly-sought after place in the state police force, senior superintendent Jitender Rana said by phone from the state capital of Patna.
But many of those candidates who sat the tough exam were not the same ones who turned up for the next stage of the selection process, Mr Rana said.
"The fraud was detected when the signatures, photographs and fingerprints of the candidates were matched with those who had appeared for the exam," he revealed.
"We don't have the exact figures but approximately 1,000 people have been arrested so far over the last few days. These cases are of impersonation and providing false and forged documents."
While most of those arrested had hired doubles for the exam, others allegedly submitted documents which turned out to be forged.
Earlier this month, police detained more than 1,000 people over another cheating scandal that saw relatives scale the walls of a school exam centre to help students.
TV channels and photographs showed dozens of people clinging to the windows of a four-storey building to pass cheat sheets to candidates.
The images went viral on Twitter and made national headlines.