Vishal Jangotra, one of the accused in the Kathua rape-murder case, has failed in the first semester of BSc (AG) exams. He has scored 0 and 2 marks in the exams that were conducted on January 12 and January 15, respectively, during the time the eight-year-old victim was gangraped and murdered in Kathua.

The marks were given to Vishal on the basis of his performance after evaluation of his answersheets, said Arshad, office superintendent of answersheets at Chaudhary Charan Singh University, adding that the copies were checked well before the Special Investigation Team (SIT) of Jammu and Kashmir Police came to the university to collect evidence in the rape-murder case.

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The SIT came to Meerut here recently to gather evidence against Vishal Jangotra, who is a student of Aakansha College of Meerapur in Muzzaffarnagar district.

Vishal and his family have claimed he was appearing in his BSc (AG) first semester exam when the Kathua rape-murder incident was reported. The examination centre was K K Jain Degree College in Khatauli of Muzaffarnagar district and the papers were scheduled between January 9 and January 30.

He has secured 0 marks and 2 marks in the two papers he wrote on January 12 and 15, respectively.

He scored a total of 284 marks, including those for practical exams. While Vishal did not score well in other papers too, the marks in these two papers are lowest.

The police have, however, said Vishal was in Kathua on January 12 and was one of the accused involved in the gruesome rape and murder of the minor girl. The SIT has also accused him of using proxy candidate to appear for the exams during his stay in Kathua.

The girl’s father had lodged a complaint on January 12 that his daughter had been missing since January 10. Her body was finally recovered on January 17.

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According to the SIT theory, Vishal had received a call from Jammu on January 11 from another accused, special police officer Deepak Khajuria, after which he left from Meerapur sending a dummy candidate to the examination centre. His father, former revenue official Sanji Ram, and Khajuria have also been arrested by the SIT.

Vishal Jangotra has, however, denied the charges saying he had been falsely implicated in the rape-murder case, claiming that he was writing his exams in Khatauli, Uttar Pradesh, on the day of the crime.

A team of SIT arrived here on March 23 and met CCS University officials to collect evidence to verify Vishal’s claims. The team had taken Vishal’s answersheets, admit card, attendance sheet and other documents to verify if he was present at the exam centre and wrote his papers.

Meanwhile, the CCS University has also formed a committee to probe the charges that a proxy candidate appeared in the exams.