Act that punishes organised cheating in government exams comes into effect

The UGC-NET examination that was cancelled on June 19 on grounds of being compromised and being investigated by CBI will, however, not be covered by the new law

The Public Examinations (Prevention of Unfair Means) Bill, 2024 that has provision for up to five years’ imprisonment and a fine of up to ₹1 crore for malpractices and organised cheating in government recruitment exams was notified by the Union government to come into effect from June 21.

The University Grants Commission-National Eligibility Test 2024 (UGC-NET) examination that was cancelled on June 19 on grounds of being compromised and is being investigated by the Central Bureau of Investigation will however not be covered by the newly enacted law.

A notification issued by the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) on Friday said, “In exercise of the powers conferred by sub-section (2) of Section 1 of the Public Examinations (Prevention of Unfair Means) Act, 2024 (1 of 2024), the Central government hereby appoints the 21st day of June, 2024 as the date on which the provisions of the said Act shall come into force.”

List of offences

The Act mentions punishments for “leakage of question paper or answer key”, “directly or indirectly assisting the candidate in any manner unauthorisedly in the public examination” and “tampering with the computer network or a computer resource or a computer system” as offences done by a person, group of persons or institutions.

Besides these, “creation of fake website to cheat or for monetary gain”, “conduct of fake examination, issuance of fake admit cards or offer letters to cheat or for monetary gain” and “manipulation in seating arrangements, allocation of dates and shifts for the candidates to facilitate adopting unfair means in examinations” are also among the offences punishable under the law.

“Any person or persons resorting to unfair means and offences under this Act shall be punished with imprisonment for a term not less than three years but which may extend to five years and with fine up to ₹10 lakh,” said the Act.

Service provider

A service provider, engaged by the public examination authority for conduct of examinations, shall also be liable to be punished with imposition of a fine up to ₹1 crore “and proportionate cost of examination shall also be recovered” from it, according to the Act.

Such service providers shall also be barred from being assigned with any responsibility for the conduct of any public examination for a period of four years.

The Act defines service provider as any agency, organisation, body, association of persons, business entity, company, partnership or single proprietorship firm, including its associates, sub-contractors and provider of support of any computer resource or any material, by whatever name it may be called, “which is engaged by the public examination authority for conduct of public examination”.