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What TV doesn't, print can't; we deliver.
NEW DELHI/MUMBAI: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Friday said that it has registered a case against former Mumbai police commissioner Sanjay Pandey and former National Stock Exchange (NSE) MD and CEO Chitra Ramkrishna, among others. The case was registered on the orders of the home ministry in connection with the illegal phone tapping case. The agency also carried out searches at 18 locations.
The CBI said that the agency sleuths carried out searches at 18 locations of the accused including Mumbai, Pune, Kota, Lucknow and Delhi/NCR etc.
CBI spokesperson RC Joshi said, “The agency registered a case against iSEC Services Pvt. Ltd based in Delhi, its then officials including Santosh Pandey, then Director Anand Narayan, then Director Armaan Pandey, then Director Manish Mittal, then Director Naman Chaturvedi, then Senior Information Security Analyst and others including Pandey and Arun Kumar Singh.
He said that the agency also booked Ravi Narain, then MD, Chitra Ramakrishna, then DMD, Ravi Varanasi, then Executive Vice President, Mahesh Haldipur, then Head (Premises), all of NSE and other unknown persons.
The official said that the case was registered on a reference from the Union ministry of home affairs (MHA) in connection with the alleged illegal interception of telephones of NSE employees carried out by its top management in collusion with iSec Services between 2009-2017.
He said that during 2009 to 2017 then MD, then DMD, then Executive Vice President and then Head (Premises) of NSE and said private company conspired to illegally intercept the telephones of NSE employees.
The CBI official said that in furtherance of this conspiracy, iSec Services was allegedly engaged in the guise of conducting a ‘Periodic Study of Cyber Vulnerabilities’ at NSE.
He also said that top officials of NSE issued agreements or work orders in favour of iSec Services and illegally intercepted the phone calls of its employees by installing machines, in contravention of provisions under the Indian Telegraph Act.
“No permission for this activity was taken from the Competent Authority as provided under section 5 of the Indian Telegraph Act. No consent of the employees of NSE was also taken in this matter,” the official said.
The official said that the transcripts of these calls were provided by the said private company and received by the senior officials of NSE. “An amount of Rs 4.45 crore was allegedly paid to said private company for this activity,” the official said.
Earlier this month, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) also questioned Pandey in connection with the NSE co-location case. Ramakrishna is already being probed by the CBI in connection with the NSE co-location case.
The CBI is already probing the irregularities in respect of the co-location facility provided by NSE, which it registered in May 2018. The agency arrested former NSE group operating officer (GOO) Anand Subramaniam on February 25 and Ramkrishna on March 6 this year. The agency also arrested Sanjay Gupta, the owner and promoter of OPG Securities Pvt Ltd, the broking firm that took illegal advantage of the NSE co-location facility.
The CBI has also questioned several senior officials of the NSE in connection with the case. Besides the CBI, the ED has also widened its probe in the case.
