The father of a JEE candidate told sleuths on Monday that his lawyer colleague Arun Choudhury had approached him with an offer to buy question papers of the test.

“Tapan Roy, a Ghatal resident, claimed to have turned down the offer,” said an official of the CID team that has been probing the JEE question paper leak.

The sleuths have accused Choudhury — who practises in a Ghatal court — of being the kingpin of the racket. He was allegedly helped by cousin Manas Patra, who worked in the state-run Saraswati Press where JEE papers are printed.

Choudhury and Patra — and a third man, Mihir Dandapat — are behind bars.

“We summoned Roy for questioning as Choudhury had claimed that he had obtained the question papers for him,” said P. Nirajnayan, the special inspector-general of the CID. “Roy denied Choudhury’s allegation. He said he had never requested Choudhury for the question papers,” said an official.

Roy said his son had passed Madhyamik with 80 per cent marks in 2006. “He is bright enough to crack the JEE without taking undue advantage. There was no reason for me to accept Choudhury’s offer,” he told the officials.

Sleuths suspect Choudhury named Roy during interrogation as he believed his colleague had tipped off the police about him.

The police have come to know that Choudhury had obtained this year’s physics, chemistry, mathematics and biology papers 10 days before he was arrested.