IAF sergeant arrested from Delhi for espionage

The sergeant was posted in the IAF office since 2018. He was honeytrapped around a year ago by a woman agent of Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), said a crime branch officer who is associated with the case, asking to remain anonymous.

The Delhi Police on Thursday said they have arrested a 31-year-old Indian Air Force (IAF) sergeant for allegedly leaking “classified and sensitive” information about defence installations and service personnel to an agent of the “adversary country”, after being “honeytrapped” through a social networking site.

(Representational image)

The sergeant, identified as Devendra Kumar Sharma, was arrested by a crime branch team on May 6, following investigation into a complaint by the IAF registered under the Official Secrets Act (OSA). Sharma was working as an administrative assistant (GD) at the Indian Air Force Records Office at Subroto Park in Delhi, the Delhi Police in a statement on Thursday.

Sharma, a native of Kanpur in Uttar Pradesh, was posted in the IAF office since 2018. He was honeytrapped around a year ago by a woman agent of Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), said a crime branch officer who is associated with the case, asking to remain anonymous.

“Sharma leaked many sensitive and secret documents to the woman agent and was suitably remunerated for the same. He received a few lakh rupees in someone else’s bank account. Some illegal money transactions were also found in his wife’s account. He shared the classified documents with the agent through electronic means after deceitfully obtaining them from computers and other files. Being in the records office, he easily accessed the documents,” the officer said.

An air force official who asked not to be named said that Sharma has been dismissed, following his arrest in the espionage case. “The case is being investigated by the Delhi Police,” said an IAF official, who asked not be named.

A second crime branch officer, who also spoke on condition of anonymity, said that the IAF authorities in their complaint alleged that they suspect Sharma was leaking classified information, but they were not sure about his involvement. The crime branch team carried out a detailed enquiry into the complaint and collected evidence of Sharma’s role in the case. He was arrested from Dhaula Kuan area and interrogated by the crime branch team, the officer said.

According to the officer, Sharma told the police that the alleged ISI spy used an Indian telephone number to contact him. The investigating team has written to the telecom company to check on whose papers the said phone number was registered, he said.

“Investigators are probing if more people were involved in the espionage link. Some incriminating evidence such as electronic gadgets and documents were seized from Sharma,” the second officer said, adding that sergeant has been sent to jail after interrogation.

In July last year, the crime branch had arrested two persons, including an Indian Army Naik, under the Official Secrets Act (OSA) for allegedly providing classified documents to ISI operatives. The development had come after a 34-year-old vegetable supplier at the Pokhran Army base camp was held for allegedly getting sensitive documents from an army officer and providing them to the ISI.