Big breach at BrahMos missile unit: Agent passing on information to Pak-US arrested

New Delhi, Oct 8: There was a major security breach at the high profile Brahmos missile unit in Maharashtra's Nagpur. A spy with an affiliation to the ISI, Pakistan was arrested for allegedly sharing top secrets.

The spy identified as Nishant Agrawal was nabbed in a joint operation by the Anti Terrorist Squads of Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh. He originally hails from Uttarakhand and was working as a systems engineer.

The police were on his for sometime, but intensified the trail from Saturday onwards. He has been accused of leaking key technical information to the ISI. Sources say that they are also now finding out if he was passing on information to other spy agencies as well. He is being questioned if he was also in touch with anyone from an American agency.

The police say that he had been arrested from the Defence Research and Development Organisation which makes fuel for the BrahMos missile.

BrahMos Aerospace, which has its base near Nagpur is a joint venture between India and Russia. It may be recalled that last year, it had tested certain advance versions of the weapon system.

Sources tell OneIndia that they are ascertaining the sensitivity of the information that had been leaked. Prima facie, it appears that he had been giving out information in exchange for money. His laptop and phones have been seized by the agencies. A team of the Central Intelligence Bureau too would join the probe to get more details. The source also added that he was in touch with the foreign agencies for sometime now.

He had been under the radar of the agencies for sometime now. However since Saturday night, the agencies kept a very close watch on him. On Monday the premises was raided following which he was arrested. He has been booked under the Official Secrets Act.

The operation against Agrawal was a top secret one. None, other than the two agencies that worked together had wind of the operation. Agrawal had been working with this unit since the past four years. Last year, he was even given the Young Scientist Award.

This arrest comes in the wake of a series of similar arrests. The ATS in UP had arrested a BSF jawan from Noida after he was caught sharing information with the ISI. A similar arrest had also taken place in Uttarakhand last year. A Madhya Pradesh resident was recently honey-trapped into sharing information about operational details of the police academy.