New Delhi, August 2
Even as the Naval Headquarters continued to reel under the load of data leak from its war room, reports emerging from the Navy said that one of the Directors of Naval Operations attached to the war room and two officers of the Commanders level had been identified as the main men behind the transfer of data.
While the Chief of Naval Staff, Admiral Arun Prakash, yesterday held a meeting with senior officers attached to Naval Headquarters pointing out the seriousness of the breach in the war room and that all were responsible for it, sources said that the Director of Naval Operations had been identified as the kingpin behind the leak of information. The word emerged that all the three officers had now been put under house arrest.
What is bothering the Navy is that it was still to ascertain for how long the information has been going out of the war room as it has recovered a pen drive with the download of at least 100 documents. There is a feeling that such pen drives could have gone out of the war room earlier also. The interrogation of the three officers is being carried out by
naval officers along with officials from the IB and RAW.
Sources in the Navy said that while the authorities were trying to downplay the issue but the breach was of a very serious nature. Besides the leak has been from the main war room which stores all the real time deployment data and not from the projection room which the Navy has been trying to reflect.
The issue of leak of data from the war room emerged about 10 days ago when the war room officials hit upon some of the documents. The Naval Chief then informed the intelligence agencies about the issue before proceeding for a foreign tour.
The Navy had yesterday admitted to “certain procedural lapses” in handling of the information stored in computers in its war room. It has also set up a four-member committee headed by a Rear Admiral to go into the matter. The committee would give its report in 10 days time.
Sources said that what the navy is claiming that there was only commercial data stored in the computers was wrong. Commercial data remains with the plan and procurement department in the Navy and there is no reason for such commercial details to be in the war room. Besides the Navy’s theory that the computers were protected with a triple word password also flies into thin air in view of the fact that one of the main persons of the war room itself is involved in the leak of information.
Vice-Admiral Sureesh Mehta, Deputy Chief of Naval Staff, told reporters that no “secret or operational plan of movement of warships and submarines” had been leaked out in an unauthorised download of sensitive matter in the Navy’s war room in South Block. According to reports the Director of Naval Operations who has been put under house arrest was one of the brightest and the fastest rising officers in the navy. He along with the two commanders have now been removed and attached to INS India to be put under house arrest.
Incidentally, in his meeting with the naval officers, the Chief of Naval Staff is said to have given his men a free hand to report any suspicious activity of any person which might come to their notice. The Navy is also expected to carry out some procedural changes following this incident.
