Corporate espionage: It's a Rs 10,000 crore scam, says Santanu Saikia

NEW DELHI: Top executives of RIL, ADAG, Essar, Cairn India and Jubilant Energy will be summoned soon for questioning in the corporate espionage scam after the five mid-level officials of these corporates in custody are said to have confessed to have been working on the directions of their superiors, as per police sources close to the probe.

Delhi Police told this much to a court on Saturday, while producing the five arrested executives. “They used to know about the government policy much in advance. We have to analyse how their acts were extending benefits to their companies. They were procuring sensitive documents at the behest of their senior officials. Documents related to national security have also been recovered in the case,” police told the court which sent the five executives to police custody for the next three days. Police sources told ET the arrest of some top executives of the above-mentioned corporates is a “possibility” given the revelations in the investigation.

In another development, the arrested journalist-cum-consultant Shantanu Saikia told mediapersons that he was just doing a “cover-up” of what he termed a Rs 10,000-crore scam. “Quote me, I was doing a cover-up. It’s a Rs 10,000-crore scam,” Saikia shouted out from the police van on spotting journalists standing there.

The police are now saying that thousands of secret documents pertaining to ministries of petroleum, finance, coal, power, defence and finance have been recovered from the 12 accused arrested so far. “National interest was taken for a ride in the case,” Delhi Police has told the court.

It was also known on Saturday that the five executives arrested on Friday are all mid-level employees of the corporates. While Shailesh Saxena is manager, corporate affairs with RIL, Subhash Chandra is a senior executive with Jubilant Energy, Rishi Anand is a deputy GM with Reliance ADAG, KK Naik is GM with Cairns India while Vinay Kumar is a deputy general manager with Essar. Home minister Rajnath Singh on Saturday said that those involved in the espionage scandal would not be spared and strictest punishment would be given to them.