Jamshedpur, June 16: A four-member CBI team from Ranchi today raided several places in the city to gather evidence and trace those involved in the flourishing fake degree racket. The team found several incriminating documents and forged degrees.

The team was headed by additional superintendent D.R.S. Yadav and included B.C. Chaurasia, M. Gupta and S. Thapa.

During their stay in the steel city, they raided several places on the basis of information given by one P. Dasrath, an employee of the South Eastern Railway, who was recently arrested by CBI for securing the job on basis of a fake BSc (Honours) degree from Ranchi University.

Dasrath was posted in the pathway inspection department at the Tatanagar railway station.

According to an officer in the Ranchi CBI office, Dasrath not only had a fake degree from Ranchi University, but his matriculation certificate from the Bihar Secondary Examination Board was also forged and made available to him by someone from the city.

During intensive raids in the city on the basis of information by Dasrath, the team raided several places, including a house in Birsanagar, in search of one Yogendra Sharma. However, the official refrained from disclosing other places where the team conducted raids.

”Although Sharma managed to evade arrest, the team found several incriminating documents, forged degree certificates and some diaries from his Birsanagar residence,” the official said.

On basis of the documents seized during the raid, it was evident that a racket was flourishing in the steel city, he said. He, however, did not rule out the possibility of the involvement of some employees from the local colleges in the flourishing fake degree racket of Ranchi University during late 1980s and early 1990s. “The CBI has identified a sizeable number of fake degree cases. We think that several people are in possession of forged certificates,” the officer said.

The team, which returned to Ranchi this afternoon, will once again go through the documents seized from the steel city to trace the involvement of other people whose names appear on the certificates and diaries.

“Once the scrutiny of seized documents is completed, it will be cross-checked with the confessional statements of Dasrath,” the official said, adding “Only then, we will be in a position to name the associates of Sharma, who have been helping him run the fake degree racket.”