New Delhi:
Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee raised a controversy when a letter sent written by him to the Prime Minister in September said 16 "planted adhesives" were spotted in different parts of his ministry, including his office.
The Opposition reacted, alleging it is his own government doing so; the centre says it's all bogus.
But how easy or difficult is it to bug offices and spy on people? NDTV does a reality check.
Sanjeev Deswal is a private detective who specialises in bugging. He demonstrates how the Finance Minister's office could have been bugged.
Within 15 seconds of walking inside an office, Mr Deswal places his recording bug which can record for a week almost 20 hours of conversation.
And no one noticed him putting the bugs.
These bugs may look tiny but good ones can cost anything from Rs 30 thousand to Rs 2 lakh.
"There are bugs available in the market that can in fact record for even a week or even 15 days with a single battery," said Mr Deswal, President, Aider Detectives.
He says that people are being spied through bugs for over 15 years, but to know how to find a bug one has to know how to place one.
"This is the kind of bug that we use. The best place to place the bug is somewhere where the target is working, like near his computer or even under the laptop, or use a double sided adhesive tape and with this you attach the bug," he says.
But what about the chewing gum theory? The government says that it was not adhesive but chewing gum that was found stuck in 16 places in the Finance Minister's office.
"Chewing gum can harden and fall so I don't think its gum. However, it is possible too that an unskilled person may have used it to immediately gather information and then remove the device leaving the substance behind," said Mr Deswal.
Deswal also said that he gets as many as dozen orders to debug monthly, and with at least 300 agencies in Delhi, clearly bugging people is a booming business.