Take IT expert help to determine whether original OMR sheets can be retrieved: HC

Kolkata: The Calcutta High Court on Friday directed the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to take help of any IT expert, including ethical hacker, to

determine whether the original OMR sheet can be retrieved digitally.

On July 2, Justice Rajasekhar Mantha had reprimanded the CBI and asked the Central agency’s counsel to take instructions on whether they can retrieve the server or hard disk in which scanned OMRs were kept. According to an advocate representing the petitioners, the CBI on Friday submitted that it was destroyed and they cannot retrieve the same.

The advocate for the petitioners argued that if anything was stored in a digital platform, as claimed, then it must have a digital footprint. The High Court gave CBI six weeks time to seek the help and determine whether the same could be done.

In an earlier hearing, Justice Mantha stated that the West Bengal Board of Primary Education (WBBPE) claimed that OMR sheets were scanned, in that case, it must be kept in a hard disk or server. Justice Mantha asked the CBI whether they have the hard disk and if it does, the Court needs to be informed.

It was further observed that if the agency fails to provide the same, then the probe might be missing the right point.

The Board had informed the High Court that the original OMR sheets were destroyed but digitised information was kept.

On May 3, Justice Mantha had raised several questions with regards to the facets of the case. One of the questions was: “Does the CBI need to engage another private reputed organisation to attempt to retrieve the erased data captured by the ADF Scanner?” The scanning was done using an ADF Scanner. This scan would save the mirror image of the original OMR sheet answered by each candidate. The data stored by this ADF Scanner was allegedly destroyed by Kaushik Majhi, a partner of S Basu and Company, who had supplied 8,000 OMR sheets to the Board as per CBI report.

What is available with S Basu and Company is the mirror image captured by a SEKONIC Scanner, data whereof is editable.

The digital data prepared on the basis of the images of the OMR sheets scanned by the SEKONIC Scanner are therefore not reliable and the OMR sheets captured by this process can be manipulated, the Court had observed.