Bengaluru, Apr 27 (IANS): The PSI (police sub-inspector) recruitment scandal in Karnataka has taken a serious turn with the state government transferring ADGP, Recruitment, Amrit Paul on Wednesday.

The transfer by the BJP government, at a time when CID sleuths have intensified investigations of the scandal which has exposed rampant corruption prevailing in the recruitment process of PSIs, has raised many questions.

The government has deputed another senior IPS officer R. Hitendra as ADGP, Recruitment.

According to sources, CID sleuths have been preparing to quiz Superintendents and Supervisors of examination centres and ACP ranked officers who were deputed for security during exams. Sources also said that CID sleuths had conducted inspection of the office of the ADGP, Recruitment.

Meanwhile, CID sleuths are still hunting for BJP leader from Kalaburagi district Divya Hagaragi, who is dubbed the kingpin of the scandal. A local court had issued the arrest warrant against 6 persons including Hagaragi.

The court had warned that if the accused do not surrender to the investigating authorities within a week, their properties will be seized. Sources in the Police Department noted that such an order is passed on rare occasions, as similar orders were earlier passed against estranged don Dawood Ibrahim and his associates.

The police have arrested 16 persons in connection with the scandal so far including both BJP and Congress leaders.

Ruling BJP suffered a setback after the photographs of accused Hagaragi with Home Minister Araga Jnanendra surfaced on social media. However, the party heaved a sigh of relief after her photographs with state Congress chief D.K. Shivakumar also came out.

The examinations for 545 posts of PSIs were held in October last year. As many as 54,041 candidates appeared for exams. The results were announced this January.

Later, the allegations surfaced that candidates who gave a very poor performance in descriptive writing got maximum marks in Paper 2. However, the Police Department and the Home Minister denied any irregularities in the exams.

One of the candidates filed an RTI application seeking information on OMR sheets of one of the candidates. Though the application was rejected, the OMR sheet of the candidate appeared in public domain. Police sources say that Veeresh, the candidate, had attended only 21 questions in paper 2 but got 100 marks. He was given 7th rank.

Congress MLA Priyank Kharge had alleged that more than 300 of the 545 candidates had paid Rs 70 to 80 lakh bribe to officials and ministers to become PSIs. Ruling BJP has challenged him to produce evidence before CID.