New Delhi: The corporate espionage trail deepened today with the Delhi Police arresting two officials of the Environment Ministry and UPSC even as investigators said that no official documents have been stolen from these two organisations.
What has alarmed the Crime Branch officials is that the two have said that they have been involved in this business since the last 15 years. Police have detained some more persons for questioning in this regard and more arrests are likely in the case.
"Jitender Nagpal (40), PS to Joint Secretary in Forest and Environment ministry and Vipan Kumar (42), PA to a UPSC member were arrested late last night. Kumar had joined service as a Stenographer Grade D in Ministry of Petroleum in 1996 where he served till 2010. He has been getting documents stolen from there either himself or with the help of his contacts," said Joint Commissioner of Police (Crime) Ravindra Yadav.
Mr Nagpal had also joined service as a Stenographer D in 1994 in the Ministry of Law & Justice. He has mostly served in Ministry of Law from 1994-2007, with a short stint of two years (2001-03) in Ministry of Chemical & Fertilisers. He used to procure the documents from Vipan Kumar, Lokesh Sharma and others, he added.
According to police, both of them have disclosed that they were indulging in this illegal activity since many years.
They shared a common e-mail ID which was being used to forward documents to some of their clients. They were produced in a local court and have been remanded to 5 days police custody.
The two were arrested under the second FIR in which five people were named earlier including Lokesh Sharma, an energy consultant of Noida-based Infraline consultancy firm who was apprehended on Monday by the Crime Branch busting the second module in the corporate espionage case.