Army man to face enquiry for being 'honey-trapped'

The Indian Army has ordered an enquiry against an infantry officer who had been allegedly honey-trapped in Bangladesh and then blackmailed by Pakistan’s ISI, which wanted him to do its espionage job.

The Indian Army has ordered an enquiry against an infantry officer who had been allegedly honey-trapped in Bangladesh and then blackmailed by Pakistan’s ISI, which wanted him to do its espionage job.

The officer, a lieutenant colonel whose name has not been disclosed, was undergoing a staff college course at the Military Academy in Dhaka.

Sources said on Tuesday a woman approached the officer at a party in Dhaka two months ago. Subsequently with alleged tapes of the officer and the woman together, some ISI agents blackmailed the officer, sources added.

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The officer reported the incident to the Indian high commission in Dhaka and was immediately recalled. A senior officer is heading the army enquiry team.

The army rules prohibit any officer from having intimate relations with anyone other than “permissible people”. This is the second time in the recent past that a senior officer of the Indian armed forces has been “honey-trapped”.

Early this year, the Indian Navy dismissed Commodore Sukhjinder Singh, posted in Russia to overlook the retrofitting of aircraft carrier Admiral Gorshkov, for allegedly having intimate relations with a woman there.

However, it could not be proved that his links with the woman had had any impact on the aircraft carrier project, for which the Russians had several times hiked the cost of repair and overhaul.

Last year diplomat Madhuri Gupta had been charged with handing over sensitive documents to Pakistan when she was posted in Islamabad.

There too the ISI was involved and Gupta was said to be having a liaison with a Pakistani.

With inputs from PTI