Lucknow, Aug 10 - Police in Allahabad have unearthed a scam within their forces in which it was found that at least 27 serving policemen had acquired fake educational degrees to get their jobs, officials said.

The scam came to light after the police earlier this week found out that an institution was involved in selling fake marksheets and various educational degrees.

'Based on an information, we raided the Hindi Sahitya Sammelan - Prayag (HSSP) Thursday and recovered a large number of marksheets, certificates and degrees ranging from Class 10 to graduation. Initial investigations revealed that 27 people used these forged documents to get into the police force,' Superintendent of Police (City) A.K. Vijeta told IANS.

'Strict action will be taken against them once the investigations are over,' he added.

The probe also revealed that two people had got jobs in the Uttar Pradesh State Electricity Supply Board and the Indian postal department with fake degrees.

'The investigation will surely reveal many more such scandals and we hope to unearth such anomalies in other government departments also,' Additional Superintendent of Police Vinod Pandey told IANS.