The Jharkhand BJP has accused the state’s School Education Department of a ₹75-crore Aadhaar scam, alleging that a private agency contracted for enrolment and biometric updates collected illegal fees from students despite a clear “no charge” mandate in the official agreement.
BJP spokesperson Ajay Sah said the alleged fraud was enabled through a nexus between the Jharkhand Education Project Council (JEPC) and MKS Enterprises, the agency appointed in March 2023 to handle Aadhaar services for schoolchildren. He said the government was “looting even schoolchildren” by allowing the practice to continue for nearly two years.
According to tender documents shared by the BJP, Aadhaar generation for all students and mandatory biometric updates for children in the 5–7 and 15–17 age groups were to be provided free of cost. The agency was to be paid by UIDAI through JEPC at a capped rate of ₹50 per successful enrolment or update.
Sah alleged that while the contract mandated free services, digital records show fee collection at around 250 Block Resource Centres across the state. He said illegal collections alone added up to about ₹36 crore over two years, with an average of ₹2,000 generated daily from each centre. He added that the agency also received about ₹36 crore from the Centre for the same work, resulting in “double payments.”
The BJP also accused the agency of exploiting Aadhaar supervisors by charging each of the roughly 500 recruits a security deposit of ₹50,000, amounting to about ₹2.5 crore. Acknowledgement receipts shown by the party suggest that supervisors were not only made to pay deposits but were later subjected to heavy fines when they raised concerns over delayed salaries. One document includes a fine of ₹23,000 imposed on a supervisor for “collecting fees” for a service that was contractually free.
The Congress dismissed the BJP’s charges and described them as politically motivated. State Congress spokesperson Sonal Shanti said the BJP had no moral ground to speak on corruption, pointing to irregularities that surfaced during the previous government. He said the present coalition had taken steps to curb such practices and that agencies, including the ACB, were acting against corrupt officials. He added that improvements in school attendance and ongoing reforms showed the government’s focus on strengthening education rather than engaging in political allegations.