Multiple police teams probing the incident of violence at Secunderabad Railway Station have not yet found any clinching evidence to confirm a ‘conspiracy’ angle during their questioning of dozens of youth detained in the case.
However, the investigators stumbled upon enough leads to draw inferences that some persons running coaching institutes for army jawan job aspirants were connected, at least remotely, to the violence. Some persons, police found, are operating centres on campuses spread over several acres on the city outskirts to ‘train’ youngsters aspiring for jobs at the entry level in the army.
Some of these institutes or academies are built on a massive scale on the fringes of Ghatkesar and Bommalaramaram and other places. Thousands of youngsters are ‘coached on how to get selected’ for the posts.
The basic goal would be to clear the physical test followed by medical check-up. After the two stages, they have to appear for the written test.
There are both day and residential training courses. “While fees are charged for the physical and written exams, an additional amount of ₹1 lakh is collected from each of the candidates clearing the written exam,” says a police officer associated with the investigation. Put simply, if 100 candidates out of the 500 trained in an institute get selected, the owner stands to make ₹1 crore.
“With no army recruitment test completed in the past two to three years due to various factors, including the COVID-19 pandemic, owners of such centres are in a financial stress of sorts,” the officer says, having grilled some of the youngsters detained in the case.
A considerable number of candidates trained at these institutes are awaiting written tests. The institutes hoped to reap massive monetary gains after the written tests which were not held. The Centre’s announcement of Agnipath scheme blew up their hopes of cash flow.
“To ensure that the candidates paid money to them after clearing tests, owners of some coaching academies kept the SSC certificates of the trainees in their custody,” the police officer explains. They took advantage of the frustration of candidates, whose dreams of securing permanent jawan posts got shattered with the Centre not taking a clear stand on their fate, and exhorted them to take the path of agitation, investigators suspect.
In fact, they began organising themselves into teams and used WhatsApp groups to share their feelings, ideas, future course of action and representing to the authorities at the Army Recruitment Office in Secunderabad.
Video clips showing some youngsters carrying wooden logs and going on a rampage by damaging railway property while covering their faces with masks raised suspicions of a possible infiltration of anti-social elements into those groups.
“All of them are being identified. Most of them are aggrieved army job aspirants,” says the police top brass on the condition of anonymity.
