The Hindu : Sensational spy case which rattled the Rajiv Gandhi Govt.

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Jul 17, 2002

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Sensational spy case which rattled the Rajiv Gandhi Govt.

By Our Staff Reporter

NEW DELHI JULY 16. The sensational Coomar Narain espionage case hit the headlines in 1985 and rattled the then Rajiv Gandhi Government as a majority of the accused were officials working in the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) and the Rashtrapati Bhavan secretariat.

The Tilak Marg police had lodged an FIR in the case on January 17, 1985 on the basis of secret information with the Crime Branch of the Delhi police that Chitter Venkat Narayan alias Coomar Narain (since dead) was indulging in espionage activities.The charges in the case had been formally framed on March 3, 1986. Coomar Narain, then Regional Manager of the Maneklal Industries Limited of Mumbai, Yogesh T. Maneklal, then Managing Director of the Industries, B.K. Aggarwala, a businessman, S. Sankaran, then Senior P.A. in the President's Secretariat, Ashok Kumar (since discharged), then P.A. to the Deputy Secretary, President's Secretariat, Jagdish Chandra Arora, then P.A. to Secretary, Defence Production, Jagdish Mittar Tiwari, Senior P.A. to Additional Secretary, Ministry of Defence (MoD), Amrik Lal, Senior P.A. to Joint Secretary (Supply) MoD, V.K. Palani Swamy, in the Ministry of Shipping and Transport, A.P. Sarathy (since dead), retired Civilian Officer, Directorate of Planning and Co-ordination, MoD, H.N. Chaturvedi, Assistant EP (LSC), Ministry of Commerce, T.N. Kher, P.S. to the then Principal Secretary, P.C. Alexander (to the then Prime Minister), R. Gopalan, Senior P.A, Shiv Lal Chandia, P.A. and K.K. Malhotra, P.A. to the Principal Secretary to the P.M., Swaminath Ram, UDC in the office of the Principal Secretary to the P.M., and K.C. Sharma, earlier P.A. to the Planning Commission had been charged with criminal conspiracy and leaking out important classified information and data to foreign agents, the chargesheet said.

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