CBI may book Abhishek Verma under Secrets Act

The CBI is set to lodge a fresh case against suspected arms dealer Abhishek Verma under the Official Secrets Act for alleged possession of classified defence documents.

The CBI is set to lodge a fresh case against suspected arms dealer Abhishek Verma under the Official Secrets Act for alleged possession of classified defence documents.

The documents are related to arms procurement plans for the Indian army. Verma’s former business associate, C Edmonds Allen, had submitted the set of documents to the CBI.

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“The CBI had forwarded the documents to the ministry of defence to verify their authenticity. It has been confirmed that they were indeed secret papers,” said a CBI officer. “We will soon lodge a case under the Official Secrets Act against Verma and a few others who helped him get the papers,” he added.

Since June, the CBI had booked Verma in two corruption cases. The first is a bribery charge. Verma allegedly accepted bribes to influence public servants to get a Swiss arms manufacturing firm off the government blacklist. The second relates to fabrication of government documents.

Lawyer Vijay Aggarwal, who represents Verma, told HT, “There is no proof that any document originated from my client”.