Latest news with #RawatpuraSarkar
India Today
10-07-2025
- Politics
- India Today
Why a godman from MP faces CBI heat in mega medical colleges scam
A Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into a multi-state medical college inspection scam has spotlighted a self-styled godman who runs an empire of educational institutions and apparently has strong political connections. The CBI, on July 1, arrested six people, including three doctors, in Chhattisgarh's Raipur while allegedly accepting a bribe of Rs 55 lakh for issuing a favourable inspection report to a city-based medical college, the Shri Rawatpura Sarkar Institute of Medical Sciences and medical college is run by a trust of the godman from Madhya Pradesh, Sant Ravishankar Maharaj aka Rawatpura Sarkar. His main ashram is located near Lahar in the state's Bhind Sarkar has been named in the first information report (FIR) along with 33 others. The arrests and ongoing investigation have blown the lid off a wide racket involved in facilitating recognition for medical colleges, and allegedly involving health officials, doctors, academics and middlemen. Rawatpura Sarkar, who runs multiple educational institutions, is considered to be well-connected in both the ruling BJP and Opposition Congress in Madhya Pradesh. His trust has retired bureaucrats and police officers working for July 5, days after the CBI made the arrests, Rawatpur Sarkar was in Madhya Pradesh's Sagar, where a Shiva idol commissioned by him was to be unveiled. Present at the event were some top BJP leaders, such as Madhya Pradesh deputy chief minister Rajendra Shukla, state ministers Prahlad Singh Patel and Govind Singh Rajput, and former ministers Bhupendra Singh and Gopal Bhargava. Sources said even chief minister Mohan Yadav was supposed to be there but skipped the event after news that Rawatpura Sarkar has been named in the did the medical colleges scam work? Sources said some health officials provided screenshots of classified documents and inspection reports to medical college owners to help them obtain recognition. Medical colleges brought in fake doctors as staff and set up infrastructure on a temporary basis to obtain the clearances in return for paying hefty bribes. Regulatory approvals were manipulated to give named in the FIR from the health ministry include Anup Jaiswal, Poonam Meena, Dharamvir, Deepak, Manisha, Rahul Shrivastava and Chandan Kumar, besides Suresh Bhadoria of Index Medical College, Hospital and Research Centre in Indore. Bhadoria, like Rawatpura Sarkar, hails from Bhind. Some 40 medical colleges in Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Andhra Pradesh appear to have benefitted from the to India Today Magazine- EndsMust Watch
India Today
06-07-2025
- India Today
Who is Rawatpura Sarkar? Spiritual leader in news after CBI arrests in bribery case
Spiritual leader Ravi Shankar Maharaj, popularly known as Rawatpura Sarkar, has returned to the spotlight following a case registered by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) involving the medical college under his CBI has arrested six individuals, including three doctors, for allegedly accepting a bribe of Rs 55 lakh in exchange for issuing a favourable inspection report to the Rawatpura Sarkar Medical College in Shankar Maharaj is the chairman of this medical college, and his name has once again drawn public attention amid the controversy. Widely regarded in Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh, Rawatpura Sarkar is known not only for his religious influence but also for his expanding network of educational and healthcare in the village of Chipri in Tikamgarh district, Bundelkhand, Ravi Shankar Maharaj's early life was marked by economic hardship. He was initially enroled by his parents in Ramraja Sanskrit Vidyalaya in Orchha to become a he discontinued his education and later began spiritual practices at a Hanuman temple in Rawatpura village near Lahar in Bhind is believed that he attained spiritual powers at this temple, after which he began receiving devotees. As the following grew, space constraints at the temple led to the establishment of the expansive Rawatpura Dham 2000-2001, he established the Rawatpura Sarkar Lok Kalyan Trust, which became the foundation for launching several educational and healthcare institutions across Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh. Under this trust, multiple schools, Sanskrit institutions, blood banks, nursing colleges, pharmacy colleges, and hospitals have been set trust also runs Rawatpura Sarkar Medical College in Raipur and Rawatpura Sarkar University in Bastar, among other establishments in Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, and the investigation into the bribery case is ongoing, the spotlight on the spiritual figure and his sprawling network continues to raise questions about the growing intersections of faith, education, and public accountability.- Ends
Hans India
05-07-2025
- Hans India
Multi-city CBI raids: Bribes, godman's role exposed in medical college regulation; 6 held
New Delhi/Bhopal/Raipur: In a sweeping action exposing deep-rooted corruption in medical college regulation and accreditation, the CBI arrested six people, including three doctors, and busted a racket involving self-styled godman Rawatpura Sarkar, former UGC Chairman D.P. Singh and a network of officials and middlemen, an official said on Saturday. The muli-state corruption racket forced the CBI to raided more than 40 locations in Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, Karnataka, Uttar Pradesh and Delhi. The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has named 34 and one unidentified person in its first information report (FIR) registered on June 30, under section 61(2) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), 2023, and Sections 7, 8, 9, 10, and 12 of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 (as amended in 2018) that deal with criminal conspiracy and bribery of public servants. The FIR names of several high-ranking officials, intermediaries, and representatives of private medical colleges across India. The CBI recently arrested six people including three doctors in the case of preparing a report in favour of Shri Rawatpura Sarkar Medical College (SRIMSR), Nava Raipur of Chhattisgarh. The accused allegedly took a bribe of Rs 55 lakh from the college management for giving a favourable report despite shortcomings in the college facilities. The accused were arrested red-handed include Dr Manjappa CN, Dr Ashok Shelke, Dr Satish A, Dr Chaitra MS and her husband Ravichandran along with Atul Kumar Tiwari. The FIR registered by CBI says that Rs 55 lakh bribe was given through hawala. Apart from this, CBI also registered a case against Ravishankar Maharaj alias Rawatpura Sarkar - the chairman of the college. The CBI had received a concrete information that some officials of the Ministry of Health and the National Medical Commission (NMC), in connivance with the representatives of private medical colleges, were committing widespread irregularities in the recognition process. These officials ignored the rules and got many private medical colleges recognised illegally and took a huge bribe in return, said the input. According to the CBI FIR, some public servants in the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and the National Medical Commission (NMC) colluded with private individuals and institutions to subvert the statutory inspection processes governing medical education. The offences reportedly occurred across Raipur, Bangalore, Indore, Udaipur, Delhi and other locations during 2024–25. Among the prominent names named in the FIR are Dr. Jitu Lal Meena, Joint Director at the National Health Authority, Dr. Manjappa CN, Professor at Mandya Institute of Medical Sciences and member of the NMC inspection team, and Mayur Raval, Registrar of Geetanjali University, Udaipur. Also named are senior functionaries from Shri Rawatpura Sarkar Institute of Medical Sciences and Research (SRIMSR), including Chairman Shri Ravi Shankar Ji Maharaj alias Rawatpura Sarkar and Director Atul Kumar Tiwari. The report reveals a staggering network of bribery, falsification of records, and leaks of confidential inspection schedules. It states that 'medical colleges were provided advance information about statutory inspections and names of assessors,' which enabled them to fabricate compliance, hire proxy faculty, admit fictitious patients, and even tamper with biometric attendance systems.
NDTV
05-07-2025
- NDTV
Crores In Bribes, Top Officials And A Godman In India's Biggest Medical Scam
Bhopal: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has unearthed what it describes as one of the largest medical college scams in the country's history, spanning across multiple states, involving senior officials, middlemen, top educationists, and even a self-styled godman. In this sensational CBI probe exposing the rot in India's medical education system, a nationwide bribery racket has come to light-implicating top names like DP Singh (former UGC Chairman and current TISS Chancellor), self-styled godman Rawatpura Sarkar, Suresh Singh Bhadoria of Indore's Index Medical College, and a vast network of officials and middlemen. The CBI has named 35 individuals in its FIR, including retired IFS officer Sanjay Shukla, who also served as the chairman of the Real Estate Regulatory Authority (RERA). Shukla, a former head of the Chhattisgarh Forest Department and PCCF, is linked to the Rawatpura group in the role of a trustee. However, so far, only one person --director Atul Tiwari -- has been arrested in the case Dummy faculty, fake inspections, and leaked files were part of this multi-crore scam that stretched from Rajasthan, Gurgaon and Indore to Warangal and Visakhapatnam, with crores exchanged through hawala and banking routes -- all to secure illegal approvals for substandard medical colleges. The alleged racket also implicates officials from the Ministry of Health. The Probe The investigation began with a bribe-for-inspection case at Sri Rawatpura Sarkar Institute of Medical Sciences and Research (SRIMSR) in Raipur, where six individuals, including three doctors, were arrested after allegedly accepting Rs 55 lakh to issue a favourable inspection report. The CBI caught the doctors red-handed, recovering Rs 38.38 lakh from an aide of the inspection team head and Rs 16.62 lakh from another official's residence. According to the CBI, the entire bribe was planned, collected via hawala routes, and distributed among the team. But what started in Raipur quickly ballooned into a national scandal. The Godman The inclusion of Rawatpura Sarkar, also known as Ravishankar Maharaj, in the FIR has drawn attention due to his long-standing ties with top politicians, ministers, and bureaucrats. Often referred to as the "Baba close to power," his photographs with IAS, IPS officers and elected representatives have gone viral on social media. Critics allege his trust received undue favours in government schemes, road access projects, and even electricity subsidies-accusations the trust has always denied. This is not the first time Rawatpura Sarkar has courted controversy. His trust has been accused of land encroachments, running unapproved colleges, forcing students into religious participation, and even mental harassment of female followers inside ashrams. Human rights commissions have probed these cases, but few reached formal prosecution stages, until now. Sources say more than 40 medical colleges across India may have obtained their recognition using bribery, falsified records, and manipulated inspections. A Parallel Operation As the probe widened, the CBI stumbled upon a parallel operation running out of Index Medical College in Indore, where officials allegedly deployed ghost faculty, forged biometric attendance, and even issued fake experience certificates to deceive National Medical College (NMC) assessors. Investigators believe that Bhadoria and Rawatpura Sarkar-both originally from Lahar in Madhya Pradesh's Bhind district-had formed a powerful nexus, charging Rs 3 to 5 crore from private institutions across India to guarantee NMC recognition, irrespective of merit or infrastructure. This wasn't a standalone fraud. The CBI found a deep-rooted network of information leaks, dummy inspections, bribery, and criminal conspiracy involving multiple layers of the regulatory system. Officials in New Delhi were allegedly photographing internal files and WhatsApping them to agents, who in turn informed college managements in advance. Among the recipients of this confidential data were Virendra Kumar of Gurgaon, Manisha Joshi of Dwarka, and representatives of several private institutions, including the Registrar of Geetanjali University in Udaipur, Mayur Raval. At the heart of this information racket was Jitu Lal Meena, a former full-time member of the Medical Assessment and Rating Board (MARB), who, according to the FIR, acted as a key middleman and used his influence to extract bribes. In one shocking discovery, the CBI said a portion of these illicit funds was allegedly used by Meena to build a Hanuman temple in Rajasthan at a cost of Rs 75 lakh. The Southern Angle The CBI has uncovered how B Hari Prasad, an agent from Kadiri in Andhra Pradesh, along with partners Ankam Rambabu in Hyderabad and Krishna Kishore in Visakhapatnam, arranged for dummy faculty and fake patients to be presented during NMC inspections. In one case, Krishna Kishore reportedly collected Rs 50 lakh from the director of Gayatri Medical College, while institutions like Father Colombo Institute of Medical Sciences in Warangal paid over Rs 4 crore to secure clearances, with bribes routed through official bank channels to appear legitimate.
