The public at large are losing faith in the exam system in the country on account of systematic frauds that have occurred in the conduct of exams, the Karnataka High Court observed on Monday while dismissing an anticipatory bail plea of the chairman of the Karnataka Public Service Commission (KPSC) in a veterinary doctors exam fraud.“The public are losing faith in the system of examinations. We are seeing so many meritorious students committing suicide in the NEET exam. What mistake have they committed? What is the loss the families have suffered? It is not the question of one result; there are so many issues involved. People are not capable of coming forward and answering the issues,” Justice Vishwajith Shetty remarked“People should be arrested on the spot. They should not be allowed to roam free; otherwise, it cannot be halted,” the HC said in oral observations.The single-judge bench ruled that the discretionary power of the court to grant anticipatory bail could not be extended to the suspended KPSC chairman Sahukar S Shivashankarappa, who is accused of facilitating the selection of candidates who paid huge amounts of money and indulged in malpractices in exams held in January to recruit veterinarians for the state.‘This is a systematic fraud’Relying on evidence of links between the suspended KPSC chairman and the perpetrators of the veterinary doctors recruitment fraud presented by the state public prosecutor B N Jagadeesh, the HC questioned the links of Shivashankarappa’s family members to the fraud.“How many members from your family are involved? This is a systematic fraud involving you, your family members, the controller of exams and the middlemen. This is what we know at this stage,” the HC said, while rejecting the arguments of Aruna Shyam, the counsel for the suspended KPSC chairman, who argued that the case was politically motivated.“Your role is much more serious than that of the candidates. The material that the public prosecutor has placed raises serious concerns. There has been prima facie material which has been placed. The matter is still under investigation,” the HC observed.Story continues below this adThe court dismissed the plea of Shivashankarappa in oral orders and said reasons would be given in a detailed order.Earlier, on August 11, a sessions court rejected the anticipatory bail plea of Shivashankarappa.Shivashankarappa’s suspension as KPSC chairman Shivashankarappa, who was suspended on August 25 by the Karnataka Governor over a separate fraud in the recruitment of his daughter as an industrial extension officer with a fake income certificate of an annual income of Rs 40,000 for her father, is being investigated by the Karnataka Crime Investigation Department (CID) for his role in a scam in the recruitment of 400 veterinary officers.Also read | Question papers handed out in resorts: What Karnataka vet recruitment probe foundThe CID told the High Court on Monday that Shivashankarappa and his son were in frequent contact through encrypted internet calls with a middleman arrested for facilitating the leaks of the recruitment exam paper.Story continues below this adShivashankarappa is suspected to have connived with the Controller of Exams at the KPSC, Gyanendra Kumar, an IAS officer, and an arrested middleman, Basavaraj Kannale, a BJP-linked businessman, to leak the KPSC veterinarians recruitment exam paper to select candidates who had paid up to Rs 80 lakh, the CID told the HC.29 candidates part of the fraudTwenty-nine candidates among a total of 329 who wrote the entrance exam for vets on January 8 and 9, 2026, are alleged to have been selected fraudulently by the KPSC, according to a First Information Report (FIR) registered by the Bengaluru police based on a complaint by vet Dr Manjunath, who did not get selected.The CID has questioned Shivashankarappa thrice so far over the fraud in the recruitment of vets, where he has claimed innocence.The CID investigation through the Internet Protocol Detail Records of internet calls of the suspended chairman, the controller of exams and the middleman showed them to be in frequent contact with each other, especially on January 8 and 9, 2026 – the days on which the entrance exams were conducted by the KPSC this year.Story continues below this adThe suspended KPSC chairman and his son were in contact with two exam candidates and Kannale, the probe has found, the state public prosecutor B N Jagadeesh told the High Court on Monday.Shivashankarappa “contacted some of the candidates who are part of this recruitment process and had extensive contact with Kannale, whom we have arrested. This shows he is linked,” the SPP told the High Court based on the CID probe.Shivashankarappa was appointed KPSC chairman in 2021 during the tenure of the BJP government and had been earlier appointed to the commission as a member in 2019.The candidates who had paid to be selected as veterinarians through the KPSC process were kept at secret locations and trained to answer the questions a day before the exams in January, and were dropped at exam centres by the mediators, the CID probe has revealed.Story continues below this adThe CID probe has found that the middlemen led by Kannale approached candidates and took payments in cash and bank transfers to provide question papers in both handwritten and printed formats at designated hotels and resorts prior to the exams.The probe has found cooperative bank accounts in the Bidar district of Karnataka – from where the middleman Kannale hailed – to which fund transfers were made by candidates who were selected as state veterinarians, the CID has reported.