An education scam in Maharashtra’s Nagpur city has come back to light after one of its whistleblowers was recently arrested regarding another issue.
Who Was Arrested?
A multi-crore teacher recruitment and financial scam has reportedly hit the Maharashtra state education department. On April 11, 2025, Ulhas Narad, the deputy director of education, Nagpur division, and Parag Pudke, the headmaster of a Bhandara aided school, were arrested at their residence for their alleged involvement in creating fake Shalarth IDs.
Shalarth is an official portal managed by the government of Maharashtra to manage teachers’ and staff records. And a Shalarth ID is a unique digital identification number given to teachers to manage their salaries and benefits.
According to a TOI report, an education department source claimed, “Narad had cancelled the Shalarth ID of this Bhandara teacher. Till then, around Rs 5.5 lakh had been paid as salary to him. Then one day we came to know that Narad has been arrested in that same case.”
However, they couldn’t verify if Narad created or approved this particular teacher’s Shalarth ID. According to the same report, Ulhas, who is also one of the key accused in the recruitment and financial scam, authorised a complaint to be registered with the Nagpur cyber cell on March 12.
As per reports, an education department employee filed a complaint at the Nagpur cyber police station about fake online Shalarth IDs being created, teacher recruitment, and claiming their salaries that the government was paying.
The employee claimed that he was authorised to do so by Narad and on behalf of the education department, after eight months of internal investigation since June 2024, when the deputy director is said to have begun receiving complaints of those fraudulent IDs.
However, it is still unclear if Narad was really a whistleblower, since a separate report claims that it was a ‘painter’ who witnessed some teachers in Pudke’s school talking about how the man in question was promoted without the required experience.
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What Is The Scam?
The Maharashtra education scam is still under police investigation, however, there are several layers to corruption here, especially related to recruitment, promotions, and fraudulent documentation.
Ulhas Narad’s arrest was due to allegations that he promoted Parag Pudke to the headmaster position despite being ineligible and based on fake teaching experience documents.
He further authorised him to back payment, five years’ worth of salary, which has resulted in major financial losses to the state. With his fake Shalarth ID, Pudke is said to have enjoyed government salaries and promotion benefits that he may not have legally earned.
This is not all, though, as a Hindustan Times report claims that a fake teacher scam since 2019 has led to a loss of over Rs. 100 crore so far. Although this scam has also occurred in Nagpur, it is not evident if this and the Narad case are connected.
However, according to the April 8 report, five school education officers might be facing criminal action for their involvement in “forgery and authorising inclusion of fake teachers and non-teaching staff in government-aided schools in order to pilfer money through their salaries.”
As per the report, twelve Nagpur schools allegedly placed 580 teachers and non-teaching staff into the Shalarth portal and drew salaries in their names. A preliminary enquiry report claims that this has apparently been going on since 2019, with almost Rs. 100 crore scammed so far.
The report, as per HT claims, “The education and officers at the deputy director level, in connivance with school managements, fraudulently registered the names of these teachers and non-teaching staff members on the portal and have been drawing salaries from the government for the last six years.”
Explaining the process further, it states, “They generated the login ID and password of the education directorate and enrolled the teachers in the 12 schools. The fraud came to light when new officers took over and refused to be part of the fraud. The preliminary enquiry report has been submitted to the education commissioner on March 7 for further action.”
Image Credits: Google Images
Sources: Hindustan Times, Times of India, Nagpur Today
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This post is tagged under: Maharashtra, Maharashtra scam, Maharashtra education, Maharashtra education scam, education, indian education, state education, nagpur, nagpur education scam
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