Vishal Yadav, an upper division clerk (UDC) at the directorate of dockyard, was taken into custody by the Rajasthan Police’s intelligence wing.
An Indian Navy staffer, posted at the Naval headquarters in New Delhi, was arrested for allegedly leaking classified information related to Operation Sindoor to Pakistan’s intelligence agency. The accused, Vishal Yadav, an upper division clerk (UDC) at the directorate of dockyard, was taken into custody by the Rajasthan Police’s intelligence wing and was sent to four days of police remand on Thursday by a local court for further interrogation.
Yadav, a resident of Punsika in Haryana’s Rewari, was arrested under the Official Secrets Acts
The criminal investigation department (CID), which had been monitoring espionage activities, found Yadav in contact via social media with a female handler from a Pakistani intelligence agency, inspector general of police (IGP) of CID security Vishnukant Gupta said.
Gupta said the woman, operating under the alias Priya Sharma, had allegedly lured Vishal with money to extract strategically sensitive and confidential information from the Naval headquarters.
Preliminary interrogation revealed that Yadav was addicted to online gaming and, in order to meet his financial needs, began compromising national security .
“He was supplying sensitive information to the female Pakistani handler and, in return, was receiving payments in USDT through his cryptocurrency trading account as well as direct transfers to his bank accounts,” Gupta said.
Gupta added that forensic analysis of chats and documents recovered from Yadav’s mobile phone revealed he had shared confidential naval and defence-related information with the Pakistani handler during Operation Sindoor, which was launched by India in the early hours of May 7.
Operation Sindoor was New Delhi’s direct millitary response to the April 22 Pahalgam terror strike that killed 26 people. The operation, during which the military hit nine terror camps inside Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK), killing more than 100 terrorists, triggered four days of strikes and counterstrikes involving drones, missiles, and long-range weapons before both sides reached an understanding to halt military action on May 10. Various intelligence agencies are jointly interrogating Yadav at the central interrogation centre in Jaipur. “Security agencies are now trying to determine who else may be involved in the espionage racket and the extent of the sensitive information that has been leaked,” Gupta said.
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