India vowed the “strictest punishment” on Saturday against anyone involved in stealing top-secret documents from the country’s petroleum ministry and selling them to energy companies, as the number of people arrested in the scam rose to 12.
Five senior executives from top refineries including Reliance Industries, Essar Oil and Cairn India were arrested late Friday following a major police sting operation to trap those responsible for leaking the classified documents, police said. Seven others, including two former ministry employees, a journalist, three middlemen and an energy consultant were also arrested.
Police said the classified documents were sold to private energy companies and consultancies. The five company executives were scheduled to appear in a local court later Saturday, where police said they would appeal for their custody to carry out further interrogation. Corporate espionage is a major problem in India. A report from the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry listed it as the ninth biggest threat to local companies in its 2014 survey.
Another industry report in 2012 said more than one in three companies was involved in “some form of espionage to gain an advantage”.
Published in The Express Tribune, February 22nd, 2015.
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