Those hired to obtain documents ‘got Rs 2.5 lakh/month’
New Delhi : A “handsome monthly amount” was paid by the arrested corporate executives to those “hired” for obtaining the “stolen documents” from the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas (MoPNG), Delhi Police said in its charge sheet submitted to a court here in the documents leak case.
The money to the tune of Rs 2.5 lakh per month was being paid to the two accused, Lalta Prasad and Rakesh Kumar, who were first to be arrested outside the Shastri Bhavan, it said.
Shailesh Saxena from RIL, Vinay Kumar from Essar, K K Naik from Cairns India, Subhash Chandra from Jubilant Energy and Rishi Anand from Reliance ADAG, energy consultant Prayas Jain and journalist Shantanu Saikia used to pay the amount to them, the chargesheet said.
[alert type=”e.g. warning, danger, success, info” title=””]The Crime Branch of Delhi Police also did not rule out the possibility of slapping charges under the Officials Secret Act (OSA) against the accused in the case, saying that reports pertaining to all the documents have not been received yet from the MoPNG and they have sought further clarifications from the ministry about it. The matter has been fixed for hearing on May 18.[/alert]
“On sustained interrogation, they all admitted that they had hired the services of Rakesh Kumar and Lalta Prasad for obtaining the stolen documents of MoPNG for their business gains,” it said.
The Crime Branch of Delhi Police also did not rule out the possibility of slapping the charges under the Officials Secret Act (OSA) saying that reports pertaining to all the documents have not been received yet from the MoPNG and they have sought further clarifications from the ministry about it.
“The reports received on April 10, April 15 and April 16, 2015 from MoPNG have been analysed and it has been observed that reports pertaining to all the documents have not been received.
“Further, it has also not been specified as to the documents marked as secret/confidential are covered under OSA or not. Further clarification in this regard is being sought from MoPNG,” police said in its chargesheet filed against the 13 arrested accused.
Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Sanjay Khanagwal on Monday took cognizance of the chargesheet and fixed the matter for further hearing on May 18.
Police said according to ministry reports, documents recovered from the accused were not in public domain and some of them were marked as “secret/confidential in nature”.
It also said that due to the conspiracy hatched by the accused, “interests of the government and public at large have been compromised. The accused have been indulging in this cheating affecting public/national interest for many years”.
Investigation regarding the role of senior officers and companies was in progress to ascertain their involvement, if any, it said, adding a supplementary charge sheet would be filed later.
Detailing the monetary transactions, police said that analysis of bank statements of Lalta Prasad and Rakesh Kumar revealed that there were significant transactions by cash and cheques despite the fact that they were unemployed.
“The money tranactions in their accounts shows that they have procured that money by illegally selling the documents of MoPNG to various prospective buyers of the companies engaged in Petroleum and Gas sector.
