Here's how a thief manages to outsmart police in India

Many economic crimes continue for a long period due to lack of specific intelligence sharing. That’s how the chor (thief) gets ahead of the sipahi (soldier), as in the fable. It’s not that various intelligence agencies don’t share information.

They do share. But some information, perceived to be sensitive for various reasons, are not passed over. Key information is not shared mainly because of the fear of losing turf. And there are a few occasions when information is not shared because of lack of trust among agencies. Also, the government moves slowly, as it has to follow certain procedures in procurement and also in getting specialised manpower.


By the time the government puts in place a new technology, the chor moves a step ahead and procures a newer version. It’s not that specialists from the private sector are not hired for work such as deciphering a seized computer’s hard disk or for recovering deleted messages. But the government is very slow in engaging tech-savvy young minds from the private sector.

Sharing of anything and everything won’t help much. A case proceeds well only if the intelligence inputs are specific. The shared information must have the elements such as location, timing, phone numbers etc.

In the case of the PNB fraud, questions are being raised about the conduct of many: the bank’s employees, the bank’s auditors, Reserve Bank of India, the Comptroller and Auditor General and even incometax department officials, particularly the assessing officers of Nirav Modi.

In this case, any investigative agency or even the state police could have come in, if an affected party had complained. But none from the bank concerned complained.

What’s needed is an effective coordination mechanism among economic intelligence agencies so as to pre-empt future frauds and white collar crimes. Since the GST is all online, it should be able to plug some loopholes.