Serving commander of Indian Navy among six others in CBI chargesheet for leaking information on submarine project
CBI Tuesday filed two separate chargesheets against six persons, including a serving commander of the Indian Navy and two retired officers, for allegedly leaking information related to an ongoing submarine project in return for illegal gratification.
The agency had in September arrested five persons, including serving and retired officers, and has since arrested one more serving officer of the Indian Navy.
“The chargesheeted officers have been identified as Commander Ajit Kumar Pandey, Commander (retired) S J Singh and Commodore (Retired) Randeep Singh apart from three private individuals who are office bearers of a Hyderabad-based company that sought the information,” CBI sources said. All the accused have been chargesheeted under various sections of Indian Penal Code and Prevention of Corruption Act.
The three private individuals have been identified as Executive Director of Allen Reinforced Plastics Ltd T P Shastri and company directors N V Rao and K Chandrashekhar.
“Another serving officer has been arrested in the case recently but he has not been chargesheeted yet. There are many serving and retired officers under the scanner. The officers shared information of commercial nature with certain private companies, one of them being a Korean company, with which one of the arrested retired officers was working. The investigation is still on,” a CBI officer said.
On September 2, CBI had conducted searches at 19 locations in Delhi, Mumbai, Hyderabad and Visakhapatnam among others from where important documents and digital evidence had been seized. The same are being forensically examined, sources said.
They added that during searches, the agency also recovered Rs 2.4 crore in cash from the house of Randeep Singh. “This included Rs 2.9 lakh trap money that he was receiving from S J Singh,” a CBI officer said.
It is alleged that the commanders, who have been serving at the Western Naval Command in Mumbai, had discussed crucial details about the ongoing modernisation project of Kilo-class submarines with the two retired officers for alleged illegal gratification, sources said.
The Anti-Corruption Unit of the agency, which handles sensitive and high profile corruption cases, was tasked to unearth the leakage of information following which the operation was started, sources added.
The unit has questioned several other officers and ex-servicemen who were in regular touch with the arrested officer and retired personnel, sources said.
“Investigation related to alleged information leak of administrative and commercial nature being with some unauthorised personnel has come to light and is being investigated by appropriate government agency,” the Navy said in a statement earlier.
An internal inquiry by the Navy is also being conducted in the matter. Sources said the Navy has appointed a high-level inquiry panel headed by a Vice Admiral to examine how information was leaked and to recommend corrective measures. The inquiry committee comprises a rear admiral as well among others, sources said.