After ED, now CBI arrests ex-Mumbai police chief Sanjay Pandey

NEW DELHI: The CBI has arrested former Mumbai police commissioner Sanjay Pandey in connection with illegal phone tapping of National Stock Exchange (NSE) employees by his IT firm that was paid crores, officials said on Saturday.

Pandey was already in judicial custody after being arrested by the Enforcement Directorate in connection with the probes against him. The CBI approached the court and got a four-day remand for his interrogation.
The CBI had earlier questioned Pandey about his role in the illegal phone tapping, at the NSE office, carried out by installing equipment with the capability of recording up to 120 calls at a time.
On the Union home ministry's instructions, the CBI registered an FIR against Pandey and former NSE chiefs Chitra Ramkrishna and Ravi Narain for allegedly tapping phones of NSE employees between 2009 and 2017.
'Pandey's firm paid Rs 4.5 crore for snooping on NSE staff'
The CBI has arrested former Mumbai police commissioner Sanjay Pandey in connection with the illegal phone tapping of National Stock Exchange (NSE) employees by his information technology firm,
A firm floated by Sanjay Pandey after briefly resigning from the Indian Police Service, iSec Securities Pvt Ltd, was tasked with conducting illegal surveillance of NSE employees by its former chiefs, said an MHA (ministry of home affairs) complaint. Pandey's firm, which had his relatives as directors upon his rejoining the Indian Police Service and going on to be appointed the Mumbai police commissioner, was allegedly given the contract of security audit of NSE servers but no breach was flagged.
According to the CBI, the company was allegedly engaged in the guise of conducting a 'periodic study of cyber vulnerabilities' at NSE and was paid around Rs 12.5 crore, including Rs 4.5 crore for "snooping on employees".
"It was further alleged that top officials of the NSE issued agreement/work orders in favour of the private company and illegally intercepted the phone calls of its employees by installing machine/s in contravention of provisions under Indian Telegraph Act," said an official.
Pandey had resigned as a police officer to start iSec Services in March 2001, but his resignation was not accepted, and he returned to police service quitting as the company's director in May 2006. His son and mother later took charge of the company.
The senior police officer, who studied at IIT-Kanpur and Harvard University, was made Mumbai police commissioner during the tenure of the three-party Maha Vikas Aghadi government headed by Uddhav Thackeray.