About Vyapam Madhya Pradesh Professional Examination Board
Madhya Pradesh Professional Examination Board (MPPEB), popularly known by its Hindi acronym Vyapam (Vyavsayik Pariksha Mandal), is a self-financed and autonomous body incorporated by the State government responsible for conducting several entrance tests in the state. These entrance exams are held for recruitment in government jobs and admissions in educational institutes of the state. The scam involved a collusion of undeserving candidates, who bribed politicians and MPPEB officials through middlemen, to get high ranks in these entrance tests. The scam also led to between 23 and 40 unnatural deaths of involved individuals, though unofficial figures run well into more than a 100 custodial deaths including the erstwhile MP Governors son and deaths in staged road accidents. Cases of irregularities in these entrance tests had been reported since the mid-1990s, and the first FIR was filed in 2000. However, until 2009, such cases were not thought to be part of an organized ring. When major complaints surfaced in the pre-medical test (PMT) in 2009, the state government established a committee to investigate the matter. The committee released its report in 2011, and over a hundred people were arrested by the police. However none of the accused have been convicted as most of them either suspiciously died in custody or were released on bail.