SCERT Scam: IAS Sewali Devi Sharma's Bail Plea Rejected

The bail plea of apprehended IAS officer Sewali Devi Sharma has been rejected by a court in Guwahati on Saturday, reports said.

Sewali Devi was apprehended in May 2023 by the Chief Minister's Special Vigilance Cell (CM’s SVC) in connection to the 105-crore State Council of Educational Research and Training (SCERT) scam. She was apprehended along with her contractor son-in-law Ajit Pal Singh from Cross Lane hotel in Rajasthan’s Ajmer.

Sewali Sharma was undergoing judicial custody since then, sources said.

Both the accused were on the run following the unearthing of the Rs 105 crore funds embezzlement case.

According to reports, the 105-crore SCERT scam involves spending funds in the name of offering a Diploma in Elementary Education (D.El.Ed.) course under the Open Distance Learning (ODL) system. The alleged financial irregularities took place from 2017 to 2022.

The sources reveal that suspended SCERT Director-in-Charge Sewali Devi Sarma gave most of the contracts to her family members, including her in-laws. What is more surprising, according to the sources, is that the Goods and Services Tax (GST) numbers of many of these firms were fake.

Devi allegedly transferred funds from the official bank accounts to the accounts of other employees and then withdrew the money from those accounts. It has also come to light that Sewali Devi Sarma had flouted guidelines and rules and started 347 centres for the D.El.Ed. course under Open Distance Learning (ODL)—288 more than the number of centres for which the National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE) had given permission. Most of these centres were allegedly fake ones.

Also Read: SCERT Scam: Sewali Sharma Accuses RTI Workers, Journalists of Blackmailing