Former BrahMoS engineer gets life sentence for spying for Pakistan’s ISI

A Nagpur court on Monday convicted and awarded life imprisonment to Nishant Agrawal, a former engineer at BrahMos Aerospace Pvt Ltd, for spying for Pakistan’s intelligence agency, ISI..Agrawal was employed in the technical research section of BrahMos’ missile centre at Nagpur. He was arrested in 2018 in a joint operation by the Military Intelligence and the Anti-Terrorism Squads (ATS) of Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra after he was booked for offences under the Official Secrets Act (OSA), Indian Penal Code (IPC) and the Information Technology Act (IT Act)..A sessions judge MV Deshpande pronounced the judgment and sentence today, thereby concluding the trial which commenced on July 20, 2022.He observed that the data on Agrawal's personal laptop contained classified information which he was not allowed to obtain or retain on his laptop. In view of this, it was presumed that the act was prejudicial to the safety or interest of the nation and hence he was guilty under the OSA."Being a scientist in BAPL, Agrawal is required to ensure strict security protocols. There should be a prohibition for use of social media platform. However, in spite of such circulars issued from time to time and giving the undertaking, Agrawal has used social media and the data was leaked. In such circumstances, it cannot be said that Agrawal was not knowing the protocols. His act has affected the national interest, affected unity, integrity, sovereignty of India. In such circumstances, no leniency can be shown to him", the judgement reads. .The investigating agencies probed Agrawal's involvement in the leak of sensitive data regarding BrahMos to his ‘handler' suspected to be from Pakistan. According to the prosecution, there was cyber activity by allurement to trap officers in an illegal espionage activity. This was basis the two Facebook accounts of women which ATS found were in touch with Agrawal.Agrawal was booked under Sections 66 (hacking, cybercrime) of IT Act, Sections 419, 420 (cheating), 467, 468 (forgery), 120B (criminal conspiracy), 121A (overawe Central or State government) of IPC along with offences under OSA..After a trial in which 15 witnesses were examined, the sessions judge found that the accused had not only stored data containing secret files on his personal laptop, but also opened fake social media accounts on Meta and LinkedIn. Further he downloaded applications which came through another Facebook account of one of the women after which his data was exposed."It affected the security, integrity, sovereignty, unity of the State. Therefore, the accused is liable for punishment for offences under the IT Act and OSA", the judge held. .A Nagpur bench of Bombay High Court had earlier granted him bail in April 2023.With his conviction, Agrawal will now have to surrender before the prison authorities. .Additional public prosecutor JC Wajani appeared for the ATSAdvocates Chaitanya Barve and Gaurav Gour appeared for Agrawal[Read judgment]