Kerala SFI Leader Arrested for Forging Degree Certificate for MCom Admission

Thiruvananthpuram: A former Students Federation of India (SFI) leader Nikhil Thomas was arrested by Kerala police on Saturday for forging a fake degree certificate for M Com admission.

He dodged the police for five days. At last, he was nabbed by Kayamkulam police from Kottayam KSRTC bus stand in the wee hours of Saturday.

The Kayamkulam first class Magistrate court remanded Nikhil to police custody for a week for further investigation.

Thomas was booked for cheating and forgery after he secured M Com admission at Milad E-Sherif Memorial (MSM) College, Kayamkulam by submitting a fake degree certificate.

Nikhil studied B Com at MSM College during 2017-20. However, he did not clear the exam. Later, he joined the M Com course  in the 2021-23 batch, at the same college in January 2022 with a 2017-20 B Com certificate from Kalinga University in Raipur. Kalinga University informed that no student named Nikhil Thomas studied there.

The SFI, initially came out in support of Nikhil Thomas. But later it istanced itself from the controversy after officials of Kalinga University informed that Nikhil had not studied there.

Nikhil was expelled by the CPI-M Alappuzha district committee on Thursday.  Nikhil reportedly alleged that SFI’s former Kayamkulam area president Abin C Raj arranged for him the fake degree certificate of Kalinga University for Rs 2 lakh. The police have included Abin C Raja as an accused in the fake degree certificate case at MSM College.