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| Security unplugged | | |
Delhi Police has recently arrested two security personnel who were allegedly passing on sensitive information, in the form of documents, pen drives and CDs, about Army establishments to their Pakistani handlers. One of them was caught, carrying sensitive information before he could proceed to Kathmandu to hand it over to his contacts for quick money.
Spying or espionage is not a new phenomenon. Both involve obtaining information by accessing the place where it is stored or developing contacts with those who have some important information. Black's Law Dictionary defines espionage as "gathering, transmitting, or losing information related to the national defence". A spy is a person employed to obtain such secrets.
Incidents of espionage are well known throughout history, as evident from the writings of Chinese military strategist Sun-Tzu to India's Chanakya. About the king's duties, Chanakya says, he keeps his eyes open through spies. All countries - including Egypt, Israel, Japan, the UK, Russia and the US - have used espionage.
Going a step further, the US launched a new six-tonne satellite in 1998 to particularly espy India and Pakistan. "The satellite will be able to spy better than earlier satellites on India, Pakistan, and other countries from West Asia to China and North Korea," according to the Aviation and Space Technology magazine. The satellite, code-named "Orion", is equipped with a 100 feet antenna that can eavesdrop on thousands of communication circuits and frequencies, providing insights into military, political, and economic policies of the targeted countries. "No radio transmission or telephone call will be secure from monitoring by the US," the magazine said. The picked-up data will be interpreted by the US Intelligence services, it added.
Not very long ago, India had beaten the US, despite its sophisticated intelligence system, when it evaded its radar spy satellites overhead to explode a nuclear bomb. This led the US bank on a fleet of smaller spy satellites to cover the world's "trouble spots".
Preservation of secrets is one of the objectives of security of information. However, some people believe that security technology can be more effective, if it is not kept secret. It is a case of security through obscurity.
A person breaking the law of secrecy can be imprisoned for espionage or even executed for treason. Spying is done through various means. The most common is human Intelligence gathered from the operatives working at the ground level. The ISI's operatives in India generally function at this level, though Geo-spatial Intelligence gathered from satellites, aerial photography, mapping/terrain cannot be ruled out.
Some previous cases of catching spies and recovery of documents in India are given below. On September 20, 1994, four people were arrested with two hand grenades and 44 photocopies of restricted documents. On September 19, 2000, two Pakistanis were arrested with copies of notes on issues that may come up during Parliament's Budget session that was to follow.
Similarly, on November 1, 2001, two persons were arrested while handing over secret documents relating to the Indian Navy to Pakistan's High Commission official, Gulam Shabbir Khan. On December 22, 2001, Ajay Kumar was arrested from a restaurant in New Delhi where he had gone to get information on defence. On March 2, 2002, Wasi Akhtar Zaidi was arrested while handing over defence documents to Pakistani High Commission officials. Likewise, on April 16, 2002, Corporal Tripati Kumar Mahapatra was arrested from Paharganj while passing on information to Ali Abbas, a Pakistani High Commission official. The list is quite long; the latest incident took place on October, 23, 2006, when two Armymen - Anil Kumar Dubey and Ritesh Kumar Vishwakarma - were arrested and charged under the Official Secrets Act, after they were caught passing defence secrets to their Pakistani handlers.
Apart from the above, there was an attempt to pass on naval data in December, 2005, in which Commanders Vijendra Rana, Vinod Kumar Jha and Captain Kashyap Kumar, who headed the Directorate of Naval Operations (DNO), were accused by the Navy of being behind the leak. According to a Defence Ministry note, "They (the three officers) have collectively, as well as individually, compromised the security of classified naval information and thereby jeopardised the interests of the state. The above acts of omission and commission can be summarised as copying/obtaining/retaining/disclosing classified information that is likely to adversely affect the interests of the state. They failed to take reasonable care of information, likely to affect the security of the state. They accepted gratification other than legitimate remuneration." Despite all these accusations, the Navy refused to court-martial the officers on the ground that "since a trial by court martial could have led to considerable delays, the Central Government has decided to terminate their services forthwith".
The Central Bureau of Investigation, in July 2006, arrested businessman Abhishek Verma in connection with the Navy War Room leak case for his alleged involvement in the leaking of classified military information. Seven people have been arrested so far in this case.
Gohar Ayub Khan, son of Ayub Khan, recently made some sensational revelations regarding the 1965 India-Pakistan conflict. In his autobiography, he wrote that an Indian mole of the rank of a brigadier allegedly handed over Indian war plans in 1965 for a monetary consideration. The cat-and-mouse game goes on all over the world in trying hard to cultivate moles in the most sensitive areas of their adversary's establishments. The ISI is not immune to such practices.
There is no doubt that Pakistan's ISI network is rather extensive and has a number of modules to foment communal tension and terrorist attacks. Then Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee, and now Foreign Minister, said that the ISI had moles in different defence organisations. Some of them operate via Nepal and Bangladesh.
In this game, we have to be one up; otherwise, all our beans would be spilled. Access to most confidential papers should be restricted to those who have a vital role to play in operations. We need keep revising and upgrading our systems, rather than saying all is well. Greed and amassment of wealth is the main temptation for moles, intelligence agents, double agents, spies, etc.
Let us not be contemptuous to our hostile neighbours, but take all possible measures to prevent our vital secrets from falling in their laps. Constant vigilance by every citizen is the price we must pay for the freedom that India won after a thousand years of slavery. Small leaks, if not checked in time, turn into gaping orifices.
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