Bengaluru : After nearly 10 years, the Karnataka State Open University (KSOU) has finally taken action against its official, who was the kingpin behind the marks card scam, involving tampering of more than 300 marks cards of BA and BCom students between 2006 and 2009.

On Friday, the varsity suspended H L Vishwanath, deputy registrar (administration), and five others, following a directive from Governor Vajubhai Vala. The action comes a fortnight ahead of Vishwanath’s retirement on May 30 (as May 31 is a Sunday).

The Governor’s office issued a notice to KSOU on May 13, following the submission of a 41-page report by the one-man fact-finding committee comprising Justice K Bhaktavatsala, retired High Court judge, the same day.

The Governor had asked the varsity to immediately take action against those responsible and initiate criminal proceedings against them, and to initiate a departmental inquiry by a retired district judge into the matter.

KSOU Vice Chancellor M G Krishnan said that he received the Governor’s notice on Friday, and that he had served show-cause notices to the six persons involved in the scam. A departmental inquiry would be ordered in the next two days. While two of the accused have retired, one individual is no longer working in the varsity.

The university has suspended and issued notices to Chandan T C, first division clerk; Kalyani C, daily wage employee. Notices have also been served on A V Uma, deputy registrar (retired six months ago); Somashekaraiah, assistant registrar (retired more than five years ago) and Rajesh, former agent to whom the work of preparing the marks cards was outsourced.
On Friday, the NR Police had arrested retired assistant registrar of KSOU Krishnamurthy and his accomplice Manjunath for cheating job aspirants.

Tejavathi, along with Gangamma, Mangala, Mahadevamma, Prem Kumar, Devanand and Sridhar, had lodged a complaint with the police, stating that the duo had cheated them after assuring jobs in the KSOU and taking Rs 12.4 lakh as advance. Police had even recovered a few duplicate rubber stamps and letterheads of the KSOU from the residence of Manjunath.