Former Mumbai Police Commissioner Sanjay Pandey appeared before the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in Delhi on Tuesday for questioning in a money-laundering case linked to the alleged illegal phone tapping of the National Stock Exchange (NSE) employees. Pandey had visited the ED office in Delhi on Monday as well and was examined for nearly three hours by the ED officials.
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) officials on Monday had questioned Pandey and another former Mumbai police commissioner Param Bir Singh in connection with the corruption cases related to former Maharashtra home minister Anil Deshmukh.
Pandey is facing two ED and Central Bureau of Investigation probes related to alleged illegal interception of phones of NSE employees by iSec Services Private Limited, a company founded by him and alleged violation of Securities and Exchange Board of India guidelines in conducting NSE's system audit. He has been questioned early this month by the ED in the alleged co-location scam at the NSE.
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) had recently registered a case against M/s iSEC Services Pvt Ltd, a company founded by Pandey, and its officials including, Santosh Pandey, then director; Anand Narayan, then directors Armaan Pandey, Manish Mittal; Naman Chaturvedi, senior information security analyst and others including Sanjay Pandey, Arun Kumar Singh along with Ravi Narain, then MD; Chitra Ramakrishna, then DMD; Ravi Varanasi, then executive vice-president; Mahesh Haldipur, head (Premises), all of NSE and other unknown persons.
The case was registered on a reference from the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) in connection with the alleged illegal interception of telephones of NSE employees carried out by its top management in collusion with M/s iSEC Services Pvt Ltd from 2009-2017. It was also alleged that the transcripts of these calls were provided by the private company and received by senior officials of NSE. Approximately Rs 4.45 crore were allegedly paid to the private company, the agency has claimed.
According to the CBI, from 2009 to 2017, Narain, Ramakrishna, Varanasi and Haldipur and M/s iSEC Services Pvt Ltd had conspired to illegally intercept the telephones of NSE employees.
Further, the company was allegedly engaged in the guise of conducting a ‘Periodic Study of Cyber Vulnerabilities' at the NSE. It was alleged that top officials of NSE issued work orders in favour of the private company and illegally intercepted the phone calls of its employees by installing machines.
No permission was taken from the competent authority as required under the Indian Telegraph Act. Neither consent of the NSE employees was taken in this matter, the agency claimed.
Pandey, a 1986-batch officer, retired from service on June 30. Before his four-month stint as Mumbai's commissioner of police, he served as the acting Maharashtra Director General of Police.
