New Delhi, Nov 28 (IANS): The CBI on Wednesday conducted raids at 26 locations across six states in connection with its ongoing probe into the irregularities in examinations conducted by the National Institute of Open Schooling (NIOS) in April 2017.

Separate Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) teams searched the premises of NIOS study centres, its current and former officials and private persons in Bhopal, Sehore, Ratlam, Umaria (all in Madhya Pradesh); New Delhi; Fatehabad and Faridabad in Haryana; Bhubaneswar and Ganjam in Odisha; Guwahati, Kamrup and Lakhimpur in Assam) and Gangtok in Sikkim.

"Around 200 items such as hard disk drives, mobile phones and various incriminating documents including admit cards, vouchers, passbooks, mark sheets, cheque books, seals, diaries, answer sheets of NIOS, payments received from candidates, fees payment made to NIOS and seating plan of examination hall have been recovered," said a CBI official.

The central probe agency on Tuesday also conducted raids at multiple locations in connection with the case.

The CBI on July 23 had registered an FIR to probe the case following a complaint by the Ministry of Human Resource and Development, alleging malpractices in the conduct of Class 10 and 12 examinations with respect to a large number of students (around 1,800).