A young man, identifying as Vipul Saini, was arrested on Thursday, 12 August for illegally accessing the Election Commission of India (ECI) website and allegedly making fake thousands voter IDs cards in his computer shop in the Nakud area of Uttar Pradesh's Saharanpur.
Saini holds a Bachelor's degree in Computer Applications (BCA) and had made more than 10,000 voter IDs in a span of over three months.
ECI had noticed discrepancies and had apprised multiple investigative agencies of the matter.
As per the police, he logged into the official ECI website using the same password that the ECI officials were using, IANS reported.
Preliminary investigation has revealed that Saini was working on the directions of someone based out of Madhya Pradesh, named Armaan Malik, PTI reported.
Speaking to PTI, Saharanpur Senior Superintendent of Police S Channappa said that he was paid Rs 100-200 for each fake ID and his bank account was found to contain Rs 60 lakh upon examination. The account has been frozen since.
"As of now, we cannot say why he was making these cards or for what purpose they were being used. There is a lot to be investigated," Channappa added, IANS reported.
Investigation agencies based in Delhi will reportedly seek the court's permission to probe the matter in the national capital.
What ECI Has Said
As per a statement by the ECI, the data entry operator from one of the offices of the Assistant Electoral Roll Officer (AERO) had illegally shared his user ID and password with an unauthorised service provider in Nakud area to print some Voter IDs.
Both persons involved have been arrested.
"ECI database is absolutely safe and secure," the statement said.
(With inputs from IANS and PTI)
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