Corporate espionage: Two men sent to judicial custody

New Delhi, March 21 (IANS) A court here on Saturday sent two men accused in the leakage and sale of confidential government documents to judicial custody till April 1.

The decision came after the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) told Special CBI Judge S.C. Rajan that chartered accountant Khemchand Gandhi and Paresh Chimanlal Budhdev, a partner in Mumbai-based Chitale and Associates were not required for further custodial interrogation.

The CBI told the court that their probe in the case was going on and various people were required to be examined to unearth the larger conspiracy.

Both accused were presented before court in connection with the leakage and sale of confidential government documents stolen from various ministries.

The court on March 19 sent four government employees -- Ashok Kumar Singh, Lala Ram Sharma, Daljeet Singh and Ram Niwas -- to 14 days' judicial custody.

An upper division clerk in the department of industrial policy and promotion (DIPP), Daljeet was arrested from his hideout in the capital on Monday and the CBI said that he was allegedly providing confidential documents to his counterparts in the finance ministry who in turn were giving them to the Mumbai-based Gandhi, who later passed them to various corporate houses.

The CBI on March 12 had filed a case and raided eight places, including offices of various ministries and private establishments, in New Delhi and Mumbai, and arrested the under secretary in the disinvestment and grievances department, Ashok Kumar Singh, along with the section officer of the economic affairs department, Lala Ram Sharma.

Gandhi was arrested from Mumbai during the raid conducted by the CBI.

The CBI had on March 13 arrested two more people -- Ram Niwas, an assistant in the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) under the finance ministry, along with Buddhadev.