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Quaid Najmi

4 January 2025 at 3:26:24 pm

TET postponed after paper leak, three held

Mumbai: In another shocker, the Maharashtra Teacher Eligibility Test (TET) question paper has ‘leaked’ - barely 24 hours before the scheduled examination on Sunday - jeopardising the future of thousands aspiring to join the noble profession of teaching, officials said here. Reacting quickly, the Maharashtra State Council of Examination cancelled Sunday’s paper scheduled to be held simultaneously at 1,028 centres across the state and said that the new date will be announced early next week. As...

TET postponed after paper leak, three held

Mumbai: In another shocker, the Maharashtra Teacher Eligibility Test (TET) question paper has ‘leaked’ - barely 24 hours before the scheduled examination on Sunday - jeopardising the future of thousands aspiring to join the noble profession of teaching, officials said here. Reacting quickly, the Maharashtra State Council of Examination cancelled Sunday’s paper scheduled to be held simultaneously at 1,028 centres across the state and said that the new date will be announced early next week. As many as six lakh candidates were scheduled to appear for the examination across 1,728 centres at 37 locations, officials said. The paper leak was detected and verified swiftly by Bhiwandi Police in Thane district which has arrested three alleged suspected, two from Bihar and one from Haryana, who were planning to hawk it for a staggering sum of Rs. 1.50 crore, suggesting the involvement of an inter-state gang behind the incident. Giving details, the Bhiwandi Additional Commissioner of Police Ashok Dudhe said that the question paper was allegedly being ‘sold’ for a staggering Rs 1.50 crore, indicating a well-organised racket transcending the state border. He said that early on Saturday, Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP-II) Dr. Pawan Bansod received a confidential tip-off and he immediately alerted senior officials who launched a discreet operation to track and apprehend the culprits. “An informant tipped us that the accused were travelling from New Delhi to Mumbai carrying copies of the TET question papers. After verification, we laid a trap and arrested the three suspects in Bhiwandi. However, the kingpin/s behind the racket remain absconding,” Dudhe said. Police said that the papers were to be sold for Rs 1.50 crore for which advance was reportedly collected from some persons. The arrested accused are: Rajiv Shah, 45 and Akash Kumar, 30, both of Patna in Bihar and Dheeraj Kumar, 28, of Panipat in Haryana. Four Sets Official sources said that the police sleuths accosted the suspected trio in a local hotel room where they were staying, questioned and searched them. They recovered four sets of purported copies of the crucial TET paper from them. Upon sustained questioning they admitted that these were the copies of the TET examination question paper of June 28. Experts from the MSCE were immediately summoned to confirm the documents recovered and the officials confirmed that many of the questions apparently were similar to those in the official TET exam paper of Sunday. Armed with the information, the Kongaon Police Station in Bhiwandi initially detained the trio, filed a case and then placed them under arrest. They are slapped with charges under the Bharatiya Nyay Sanhita Sections 318(4), 316(5) and 61(2), besides stringent sections of the Maharashtra Examination Act, 2024, said Senior Police Inspector (HQ) Shailesh Salvi. As news of the paper leak spread like wildfire, thousands of candidates vent their ire before the mediapersons and on social media, demanding an overhaul of the public examinations monitoring systems and stringent punishment to the accused. SIT Formed The Thane Police have formed a 9-member SIT comprising Dr. Bansod, Sachin Sangle, Dr. Vinay Marathe and other officers, to investigate the source of the leak, identify the masterminds, and determine whether the network was linked with similar examination scams across the country. The TET paper leak comes days after the nationwide furore over the NEET 2026 exam paper leak with questions raised on the country’s public examinations system amid claims and assurances of tight security and monitoring. Congress, CJP flay govt Maharashtra Congress President Harshwardhan Sapkal and Cockroach Janta Party founder Abhijeet Dipke pounced on the state government, accusing it of failing to safeguard the future of thousands of deserving candidates. They demanded a thorough probe and stringent action against everyone involved, lamenting how a series of examination scandals have damaged the credibility of the state’s education and public exams systems. “The government is not bothered. They are busy with breaking political parties. The so-called double-engine regime is to be blamed for the ‘double-leaks’ in such a short time. The education minister must resign,” demanded Dipke. The examination system has come under a cloud with several entrance and recruitment exams, including the NEET, UGC-NET, the Maharashtra TET and others cancelled or being probed in the past three years, triggering huge public outrage and raising question marks on the careers of lakhs of candidates.

Melody man

Updated: Mar 3, 2025

Sarod maestro Anupam Shobhakar talks to 'The Perfect Voice' about his instrument KaliMa and how music transcends all barriers and boundaries

Anupam Shobhakar

In a rich gathering of music and art, the Kala Ghoda Arts Festival saw music maestro Anupam Shobhakar perform, treating audiences to his beautiful blend of Indian and Western music. The Brooklyn-based composer, record producer and sarodist will mark Holi with a new album, Liquid Reality that combines the Hindustani classical tradition with global sounds.


He’s invented the KaliMa, an instrument that combines the guitar with the sarod. In a conversation with The Perfect Voice, Shobhakar talks about music transcending barriers of language and region.


Can the sarod play western music?

It’s totally incumbent on the musician behind the instrument. No instrument plays Indian or western music on its own. I would encourage a deep listen to an album called, Still Point: Turning World. This was a collaboration between me and guitarist Joel Harrison. The meeting of eastern and western ideas goes quite deep in it. We tried to stay away from the shallow, exotic ways these things are done sometimes by musicians from all styles. I follow that mantra myself — learn and respect all music equally.


How does music transcend barriers and boundaries?

Music is one of the only mediums that does so. It’s the very reflection of human existence. You can have two people of totally opposite cultures in terms of language or food or appearance but if they have instruments, they will communicate musically and a bridge will be born. This is a profound thing. Even animals respond to music. It’s truly a transcendent medium of communication.


What's the concept of Liquid Reality?

Liquid Reality is my new album coming out on AGS recordings and I’m very excited for it. As a global musician and composer, it really highlights the ethos of international unity for me as I live in the most diverse part of the world culturally which is New York City. It features very diverse music from a modern adaptation of ghazal to a reshaped shakti classic to fiery duos for guitar and kanjira to deep episodic Brazilian inspired music. It has some of the greatest players and improvisers alive today.


When you collaborate with artistes who excel in different forms of music, how do you manage to put diverse styles and sounds together?

It all comes down to the writing and the integrity of your ideas and aesthetic evolution. I don’t like to think of music as any different from how one puts food together. If you have good taste - your food will taste good. Music and art in general are very similar.


What exactly is the KaliMa and how does it help you express your music?

KaliMa is my new fretted and fretless double-neck guitar. Being a child of both worlds, of western and eastern musically, it was very important for me to have an instrument that covers both universes. Now from my sarod repertoire to my western rock and jazz influences - the KaliMa helps me cover it all. As for the name - my family have been Kali worshippers for generations. I wanted to honour their legacy by naming the instrument KaliMa. This instrument was commissioned in 2023 and made by a wonderful luthier from Istanbul, Turkiye by the name of Ave Guitars. He’s a one-man Stradivarius when it comes to guitar building and given how young he is, his skill is unparalleled globally according to me.


How does it create sounds that are similar to Indian and western music?

The sounds any instrument creates are up to the instrumentalist. If I want to play a two-hour rendition of say Raga Marwa on it KaliMa allows me to do just that. If I want to explore deep western harmony or just go all out playing rock and metal, the KaliMa allows and blesses that side too.


What kind of music have you created on the KaliMa?

My new Album Liquid Reality is entirely composed on the KaliMa. I have been playing Indian classical concerts all over the world on it and my trio called the Kalki trio as well with Swami selva Ganesh on kanjira and Amit Mishra on tabla. The music tends to flow more naturally for me through this instrument I call KaliMa.


What inspires your music?

I don’t think I have any external inspiration because music is pretty awe inspiring to begin with. If my mind is at ease - the music flows naturally for me. The challenge and craft come into capturing the ideas and then setting them free!

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