Society

China has launched investigation into an identity theft case in which a former police officer Wang Zhengrong was reported having helped his daughter enroll university under the name of her classmate.

Authorities in Shaoyang City, central China's Hunan Province, and the provincial public security bureau have sent teams to investigate the case in Shaoyang's Shaodong County.

Tong Mingqian, secretary of the Shaoyang Municipal Party Committee, ordered to release investigation results as soon as possible and harshly punish those involved in the ID theft case.

The father Wang Zhengrong is being investigated and the university diploma of the daughter Wang Jiajun is set to be cancelled. However, the victim Luo Caixia still could not get a teaching certificate because her ID was used by the junior Wang.

An imposter takes over

Luo, 23, now a student at Tianjin Normal University, first noticed something was wrong this March when she was applying for a bank card in Tianjin. She was told by a clerk that her ID card had already been registered with the picture of another girl, who looked like her high school classmate Wang Jiajun.

It reminded Luo of a similar case in which she was told she was not able to apply for a teaching certificate because her ID number had been used already, according to the young woman from Shaodong County, Hunan Province.

She reported it to police and confirmed that her name was used by Wang after her parents mailed her some group photos taken at high school.

Luo took the college entrance exam in 2004 and got a not-so-bad score of 514. However, she did not receive any admission letter from a college or university. She then took the exam again in the following year and entered Tianjin Normal University.

Actually Guizhou Normal University did send a letter of admission to Luo, which was intercepted and landed in the hands of Wang Jiajun. Wang graduated from the university in Guizhou Province last year and then worked in the southern metropolis of Guangzhou.

Wang Jiajun only got a poor score of 335 in the 2004 exam, including a junk 19 points in mathematics.

"I would feel better if my name is used by someone else other than my classmate. I do not know how to trust people after this," Luo told Xinhua on Thursday.

'Why me?' sats Luo

"I have asked myself many times why they chose me?" Luo told media. "Is it because my parents are farmers and have no connections?"

Luo said she felt so sorry when her father called her: "My daughter, we are bullied, but dad does not know how to help you."

She would have to work as a migrant worker, like millions of young people from rural areas who fail to pass the college entrance exam. It is fortunate that her family supported her for a second exam.

The Chinese media have been trying to find out the role of Wang Jiajun's father Wang Zhengrong in this incident. The senior Wang was the head of a township government in Shaodong County in 2002 and served as commissar in the public security bureau of the neighboring Longhui County in 2004. However, he received a three-year court sentence with a five year reprieve for bribery in 2007.

Sources said Wang was an influential figure in Shaoyang City, which administers Shaodong and Longhui.

Going to university in the name of others is not an easy job. Wang Zhengrong had to get a new ID for his daughter at the local public security bureau, fabricate files at the local education authorities and intercept an admission letter from Guizhou Normal University sent to Luo Caixia, even though Wang did not apply for the university in 2004.

Wang said earlier this week he paid 50,000 yuan (7,330 US dollars) to a middleman, who is now out of reach, to have all these tricks done. But the public would not buy it.

"It is shameful that Wang creates a so-called middleman. Is he trying to deceive the public?" a netizen wrote on the forum of bbs.people.com.cn, a popular online forum in China.

The story of Luo Caixia reflects loopholes in the education system, remarked Li Qiang, dean of School of Humanities and Social Sciences under the Tsinghua University.

The two Wangs would not have succeeded if everything is ruled by law, Li said.

A commentary in the Beijing News called for intensified legal and media supervision on the college entrance exam and reduce the interference by administrative organs on education to create a more transparent environment.

The 2009 national college entrance exam is scheduled for next month. Millions of students will take part in the world's largest state-organized test, which could be the only chance for some of them to change their destiny.

The two Wangs have been under fierce criticism across the country after the China Youth Daily first reported their story Monday. The story has since become media headlines and become a hot topic in online forums.

Liu Wanyong, the newspaper's reporter, said Saturday the public cared about the story because it was about social justice and fairness.

"Why do people care so much about the incident? I think this reflects the public pursuit of social justice and fairness," Liu told Xinhua in a telephone interview.

Despite criticism of the national college entrance exam, many people believe the exam is the fairest way for economic and social advancement in the country, Liu said.