Bhubaneswar: The woman suspect in the DRDO’s Chandipur Integrated Test Range (ITR) case reportedly operated from Pakistan through proxy IPs to keep location secret, the Crime Branch informed today.
According to Crime Branch ADG, Sanjeeb Panda, four Facebook accounts were being operated from Pakistan, including three from Islamabad and one from Rawalpindi. The accounts were using the IP address of Pakistan in addition to proxy IP addresses of India, the US, and Germany, said Sanjeeb Panda.
While some accounts are still active and further chatting has been detected, the Crime Branch has sought technical data from the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team, an office within the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology of the Government of India, Panda said.
Also read: DRDO espionage case: 'Mystery woman' was in contact with all 5 accused, proposed to marry 2
He further informed that while the first phase of interrogation of all the accused persons in the case has been completed, the Crime Branch will seek further remand of the accused after receiving the technical data.
It is worthwhile to mention that the Crime Branch has already recognised the face of the woman suspect by matching the profile photo of one of her social media accounts with a video of her. However, her identity is yet to be established.
Panda had earlier informed that the woman suspect had proposed to marry two of the accused persons. She even told one of the accused that she will visit his house at Chandipur. He had informed that the woman suspect had been using a mobile phone number of the UK (United Kingdom) and used to chat and talk with the accused persons using various social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. She had interacted with two of the accused persons through video calls as well. She used to speak in Hindi and contact the accused persons through seven Facebook accounts under different identities with different names and photographs.
Notably, the Odisha Police had arrested four contractual employees of DRDO from the ITR facility in Chandipur for allegedly leaking secrets to a Pakistani agent. The accused persons were – AC operator Basanta Behera, diesel genset operator Hemanta Kumar Mistri, employee on duty at ITR main gate Tapas Ranjan Nayak, and AC operator Sk. Musafir – all from Balasore district. The police later nabbed Sachin Kumar, a driver and permanent staff of the DRDO. Kumar, a resident of Uttar Pradesh and residing in the ITR colony, was allegedly helping the four accused in providing information to the Pakistani agent.
Also read: DRDO espionage case: Odisha Police seek Interpol help
The ITR is a laboratory of the Defence Research Development Organisation (DRDO) which provides launch facilities for performance evaluation of rockets, missiles and airborne weapon systems.
