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Former Managing Director (MD) of National Stock Exchange (NSE) Chitra Ramkrishna got iSec Services Pvt Ltd, a company founded by ex-Mumbai Police Commissioner Sanjay Pandey, to allegedly snoop the phones of at least 91 NSE employees during her tenure in the organisation, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) has found.
In addition to arresting Ramkrishna, ED had on Thursday, 14 July, booked Pandey in a money laundering case related to the alleged phone tapping.
Speaking to The Indian Express, an ED official said that they are interrogating Ramkrishna to find the motive behind the illegal act.
Pandey was on 5 July questioned by the ED in a different case relating to the alleged NSE colocation scam case.
According to the ED officials, although Pandey was not associated with iSec Services, when it was incorporated in 2001, he was running the company all along.
"Almost all correspondence between iSec and top officials of NSE are through Pandey's email," a ED official said.
Pandey quit as the director of the company in 2006, after which his mother Santosh and son Armaan took over as its directors.
A 1986-batch Indian Police Service (IPS) officer, Pandey retired from service on 30 June. Before his four-month stint as Mumbai's commissioner of police, he served as acting Maharashtra director general of police (DGP).
In its complaint, the CBI had alleged that during the period 2009-17, Narain, Ramkrishna – both former chief executives of NSE – along with others, conspired to illegally intercept the telephones of NSE employees for which they hired iSEC Services Pvt Ltd.
While seeking remand of Ramkrishna, ED told Special Court judge Sunena Sharma on Thursday that for carrying out the alleged phone tapping the NSE bosses including Ramkrishna and iSec representatives had fixed payment of Rs 4.54 crore for the company.
ED also said that it had evidence to prove that the iSec provided the illegal services only during Ramkrishna's tenure in NSE.
“It is further averred that after she relinquished the post of Managing Director of NSE in December, 2016, the contract for so called ‘Periodic Study of Cyber Vulnerabilities of NSE’ expired on 13.02.2017and was never renewed subsequently, thus proving that the said illegal activity was co-terminus with her holding key position as Joint Managing Director/Managing Director of NSE,” ED said.
(With inputs from The Indian Express, PTI.)
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