Dubai university worker who leaked exam papers to student gets sentence reduced

Indian IT technician at Dubai university used WhatsApp to send images of 15 exam papers to an Omani student for Dh7,500.

DUBAI // A university worker who was jailed for six months for leaking 15 examination papers has had his sentence reduced by an appeals court.

In March, R K, a 29-year-old Indian IT technician, was convicted of bribery charges by Dubai Criminal Court.

He was told he would be deported after completing his sentence.

The defendant, who denied the charge in both criminal and appeal courts, was fined Dh7,500.

He appealed the initial verdict and won after Dubai Appeals Court reduced his sentence to three months.

The deportation order against him was also cancelled.

The court, however, ordered him to pay Dh7,000, in addition to his original Dh7,500 fine.

Prosecutors said R K had divulged exam questions to A A.

The 23-year-old Omani denied a charge of criminal complicity but was convicted and received a similar term.

On appeal, his sentence was also reduced to three months and the deportation order against him was removed.

In June last year, A A, a media and journalism student, approached R K, whose job involved copying and printing examination questions for university faculty members.

The student offered him Dh500 for each examination paper and the latter accepted.

A A would specify the papers he wanted and R K would photograph them and send them via WhatsApp.

The two agreed to meet in Sharjah for A A to pay the first of two instalments.

R K was arrested a few days after taking the money.

M A, the university dean, testified that the technician was also responsible for the campus’s surveillance cameras.

“He supervises the cameras, the university’s email and also the printing of the exams with the faculty members.”

The university received a tip-off on June 1 that some examination papers had been leaked, the dean said.

Questions for the examinations were then changed and all of the IT workers were investigated.

“R K was very nervous and tense. He then confessed to the whole thing,” M A said.

R K later signed a document detailing what he had done.

Prosecutors said they found 103 images of the examination papers on A A’s WhatsApp, sent by R K.