Bhubaneswar: The Odisha Crime Branch on Tuesday arrested Manoj Kumar Padhy, former Director of Teacher Education (TE) and the State Council of Educational Research and Training (SCERT), in connection with alleged large-scale irregularities in the preparation and publication of new textbooks for Classes I to VIII.
The arrest marks a significant development in the investigation launched after a complaint was filed by Madhusmita Sahoo, the current Director of TE and SCERT. Based on the complaint, the Crime Branch registered Case No. 08/2026 to probe an alleged criminal conspiracy involving the preparation, approval, processing and publication of school textbooks.
The case has been registered under Sections 316(5), 201, 61(2) and 3(5) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), 2023.
According to the Crime Branch, Padhy, an Odisha Administrative Service (Senior Scale) officer, was responsible for supervising, coordinating, monitoring and approving the textbook development process under the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 during his tenure as Director of TE and SCERT.
Investigators alleged that he failed to discharge his official responsibilities by approving and forwarding print-ready manuscripts for publication without ensuring proper verification of their factual, scientific, geographical, translation and pictorial content. The agency described the alleged lapses as criminal negligence.
The Crime Branch stated that these omissions resulted in the publication and distribution of textbooks containing numerous errors, causing an estimated loss of around Rs 175 crore to the state exchequer while adversely affecting public interest.
Padhy was questioned for several hours by multiple Crime Branch teams before being formally arrested under the relevant provisions of the BNS. Following his arrest, he was scheduled to be produced before the Judicial Magistrate First Class (JMFC-III) Court in Cuttack later on Tuesday.
The investigation follows directions issued by Chief Minister Mohan Charan Majhi on July 11, ordering a criminal probe into the entire process of preparing, approving and publishing the textbooks after serious errors were found in school books for Classes I to VIII.
The Chief Minister also instructed the SCERT Director to lodge an FIR with the Crime Branch to enable an independent investigation.
Earlier, the state government had constituted a committee headed by the Development Commissioner to examine the reasons behind the errors in the textbooks. Based on the committee's findings, Padhy and three Assistant Directors were placed under suspension, while disciplinary proceedings were initiated against six other Assistant Directors.
With IANS inputs