7 Days Odisha Crime Branch Custody For 5 Accused In DRDO Espionage Case, Probe To Intensify

The five contractual employees of Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), arrested on charges of leaking sensitive information to foreign agents, were remanded to the Crime Branch custody for seven days by a court on Saturday.

The SDJM Court in Balasore allowed the State Crime Branch to take the five persons, identified as-- Basanta Behera (52) of Jhampura, Hemant Kumar Mistri (52) of Buanla, Tapas Ranjan Nayak (41) of Palasia and Sk Musafir (32) of Srikona and Sachin Kumar Chatta of Meerut in Uttar Pradesh on a week remand.

A special team of Crime Branch comprising Investigation Officer, Additional SP Prasanta Bisoi, Cyber Inspector, a Sub-Inspector and an ASI rank officers will bring all the accused persons to the CB headquarter in Cuttack from Balasore district for interrogation.

“All the five accused in the Chandipur case have been taken on seven days remand and they will be interrogated at the Crime Branch headquarters in Cuttack. The Crime Branch will explore various angles during their interrogation,” informed ADG (Additional Director General), Crime Branch, Sanjeeb Panda.

“We will try to identify the people they were in touch and the kind of data they had shared with them. We will also try to verify if some more people were involved in the spy ring. They will be asked the kind of financial benefits they reaped by leaking the data,” added the ADG.

The purported woman who the accused were in touch with has not been identified so far.
“At present the CB is investigating the case. However, if national agencies like NIA want to interrogate them, the State Police’s investigation wing will cooperate with them,” said Panda.

On being asked about the mysterious Pakistani woman who allegedly honey-trapped the accused in spying of DRDO info, Panda said her identity is yet to be known. Further details about the woman will be known after the thorough interrogation of the five accused is over, added Panda.Also Read

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