Illegal phone tapping case: Ex-Mumbai top cop Sanjay Pandey appears before CBI for questioning

Several days after his retirement as the Mumbai Police Commissioner, Sanjay Pandey has been on the radar of the central agencies. Recently, he has been booked by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) for allegedly tapping the phones of National Stock Exchange (NSE) employees between 2009 and 2017.

In connection to the illegal phone tapping, Pandey appeared before the CBI for questioning and recording his statement.

CBI has registered a case against a private company in New Delhi, founded by former Mumbai Police Commissioner Sanjay Pandey, its then directors and other officials and four officials of the NSE, Mumbai, on a reference from the ministry of home affairs (MHA).

According to the CBI, it was alleged that from 2009 to 2017, Narain, Ramakrishna, Varanasi and Haldipur and the said private company conspired to illegally intercept the phones of NSE employees. In furtherance to this conspiracy, the said private company was allegedly engaged in the guise of conducting ‘Periodic Study of Cyber Vulnerabilities' at the NSE. It was further alleged that top officials of the NSE issued agreement/work orders in favour of the said private company and illegally intercepted the phone calls of its employees by installing machine/s, in contravention of the provisions of the Indian Telegraph Act.

It is pertinent to mention here that the former police commissioner faced enquiry from the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in Delhi in a money-laundering case linked to the alleged NSE co-location scam.

Pandey’s questioning by the ED was related to the functioning and activities of iSEC Securities Pvt. Ltd, one firm amongst others that conducted a security audit of the NSE around the time the co-location irregularities are alleged to have taken place.

Pandey, a 1986-batch Indian Police Service officer retired from service on June 30. Before his four-month stint as Mumbai’s commissioner of police beginning March 1, he served as acting Maharashtra director general of police.

Published on: Saturday, July 09, 2022, 11:44 AM IST