New Delhi: A Delhi court on Sunday sent freelance journalist Rajeev Sharma, arrested in an espionage case under the Official Secrets Act, to judicial custody, his lawyer Senior Advocate Adeesh Aggarwala said.
Sharma, along with others, was arrested by the special cell of Delhi Police recently under the Official Secret Act. The judge also sent two of his associates – a Chinese woman and a Nepalese man – to judicial custody after they were produced before the court.
While producing them before the judge on Sunday night, the investigating officer of Delhi Police told the court that the accused were not required for further custodial interrogation. The court will hear the journalist’s bail petition on Monday.
The court, earlier ordered to provide the FIR copy to the lawyers of the accused. The court had also allowed the counsels of the accused to meet the accused of 30 minutes during their custody period.
“The nature of allegations against the accused persons pertains to offences under sections 3, 4 and 5 of the Officials Secrets Act as well as an offence under section 120-B of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) wherein the accused alleged to have been supplying strategic/sensitive information to their handlers in China. However, after going through the press release which mentions in detail the background of the case, as well as the outcome of the interrogation of the accused persons, the contents of the FIR, seem very sketchy as they do not give details of the nature of the investigation being done by police,” the court stated.
Meanwhile, wife of freelance journalist Sharma has written a letter to the special cell of Delhi Police, claiming that the interrogation of her husband is “illegal” and that police has destroyed some material evidence and fabricated others.
Delhi Police, on September 14, had arrested Sharma with the allegations of passing sensitive information about India’s border strategy, army’s deployment and procurement, and foreign policy to Chinese intelligence agencies.
According to the police, a Chinese woman and her Nepalese associate were also arrested for paying him large amounts of money routed through shell companies.
Sharma and other accused persons are currently in police custody till September 28.
Delhi Police special cell said Sharma, a resident of Pitampura in New Delhi, was “found to be in possession of some defence-related classified documents”.