The State police on Sunday arrested S. Biju, sub-inspector (SI), High-Tech Inquiry Cell, on the charge of leaking “distorted versions” of an internal communiqué to the media with the intention of fomenting trouble between different communities.
The police charge against Mr. Biju, in what has come to be known as the “e-mail case,” was that in February the suspect had allegedly passed on the questionable document (a letter purportedly written by the Superintendent of Police (Internal Security) to the Assistant Commandant (High-Tech Cell)) to the media to make it appear as if the State police intelligence had ordered the High-Tech Cell to “tap or hack” the e-mail accounts of 268 persons, most of them journalists, politicians, opinion leaders, and writers belonging to a particular minority community.
Subsequent media reports, based on the questionable “communiqué” indirectly accused the law enforcement of religious profiling, prompting the government to order an investigation.
The police said digital and circumstantial evidence pointed to Mr. Biju's involvement in the case. They have booked him on charges of conspiracy, cheating, theft, forgery, using forged documents as genuine ones, and violating the Police Rights and Restrictions Act.
He was produced before a magistrate here and remanded in judicial custody.
The 37-year-old man had been with the High-Tech Cell for the past few years.
Investigators, who verified his antecedents and contacts, said some persons based in North Kerala seemed to have cleverly recruited him for their ends, which apparently was to create a “sense of persecution among a particular segment of citizens and to warn their operatives to be vigilant against police surveillance.”
