In a shocking revelation that exposes deep vulnerabilities in official record-keeping, authorities in Maharashtra's Yavatmal district have uncovered a massive data fraud involving the creation of tens of thousands of fake birth and death certificates. This scandal, emerging from two separate village panchayats, points to a sophisticated hacking operation targeting the government's Civil Registration System (CRS).
The Shendursani Scandal: A Village of 1,400 with 27,404 Fake Entries
The scale of the fraud first came to light in Shendursani, a small village in Arni taluka with a genuine population of only about 1,400 people. Astonishingly, an audit found that a staggering 27,397 fake births and seven fake deaths had been registered in its records. This impossible number, far exceeding the actual population, immediately raised red flags and prompted a high-level probe.
The state government constituted a Special Investigation Team (SIT) headed by Additional Director General of Police (Cyber Cell) Yashasvi Yadav to investigate. The team includes Deputy Director of Health Services Babita Kamalapurkar, with District Health Officer Dr. Subhash Dhole serving as secretary. The ground investigation was entrusted to Sub-Divisional Police Officer Dinesh Baisane.
A Second Front Opens: Bhavani-Rampur Tanda's 35-Year-Old Closed Registry Hacked
Even as officials grappled with the Shendursani case, a fresh and equally audacious scam was detected in the Bhavani-Rampur Tanda Gram Panchayat in Umarkhed taluka. Here, investigators found 6,206 fraudulent birth records and two fake death records. What makes this case particularly bizarre is that the birth registration system in Bhavani gram panchayat has reportedly been closed since 1990—for nearly 35 years.
Officials confirmed that the fake registrations were executed by hacking the Civil Registration System (CRS) user ID of the gram panchayat. A team sent to the village discovered that the panchayat's official user ID had been inactive for a long time. It was misused to upload thousands of records from outside its prescribed jurisdiction.
The Bihar Connection and Ongoing Actions
The cyber trail led police to arrest Adarsh Kumar Dubey, a resident of Panditpur village in Bihar's Saran district, in connection with the Shendursani scam. During interrogation, Dubey's involvement widened. "Dubey confessed to hacking the CRS user ID of Bhavani Rampur Tanda and tampering with official records, similar to the Shendursani case," stated Dr. Subhash Dhole.
This indicates a linked modus operandi across the two villages. Gram panchayat officials have formally alerted the District Health Officer and the District Registrar. A letter has been submitted to the Superintendent of Police for further legal action. The administration has now initiated the arduous process of identifying and cancelling all the illegal entries in both panchayats to restore the integrity of the vital statistics database.
The twin scams, totaling over 33,600 fabricated entries, raise serious questions about cybersecurity protocols in rural administration and the potential motives behind such large-scale forgery of demographic data.
