New Delhi,April 30: MADHURI Gupta has spilled the beans on her Pakistani lover who pushed her to leak strategic information.
The man in the middle of the espionage row is Muddasar Rana, a senior Pakistan Intelligence Bureau officer with whom the 54- year- old Indian Foreign Service ( IFS)- B officer is believed to have had an affair. Rana was her age or perhaps a couple of years older. The two had instantly struck a chord after meeting in 2007, Gupta’s interrogators said.
They were introduced to each other by a prominent Pakistani journalist who otherwise has nothing to do with the spy ring, a source in the government said.Rana — the name could be an alias — is believed to be married. He supposedly wooed Gupta, a spinster, over cups of coffee at the Iffy Café in Islamabad, which was a favourite rendezvous point for the duo, sources said.
It was during such meetings that Gupta is believed to have blurted out her angst against senior IFS- A grade officers for mistreating her over the past three decades while she had been in service.She complained the ministry of external affairs ( MEA) didn’t give her salary for over four years when she was on a study leave. An avid driver, Gupta also nursed a grudge that the MEA had created unnecessary hurdles’ for her to bring her favourite car to India after completing a positing on a United Nations mission in Africa, a source said.
In Pakistan, too, Gupta had got a car with a diplomatic number plate, which she drove to India through the Wagah border on many occasions, her interrogators revealed.
In her interrogation, Gupta recalled how she joined the MEA as an assistant in the IFS- B cadre over three decades ago and had risen through the ranks to get various important assignments in countries such as Iraq, Malaysia, Croatia and some European nations.She had also been selected for a couple of UN missions through a procedure based entirely on merit, which spoke of her efficiency, a source said.
But her run- ins with IFS- A grade officers on various assignments in foreign countries made her sour and the Pakistan assignment provided her the first opportunity to get back at her bosses and leak some critical information she could lay her hands on to her Pakistani contacts.
Sources said Gupta was contacted by Pakistani intelligence agencies during her earlier stints in Kuala Lampur and Baghdad but it was only on reaching Islamabad and meeting Rana did Gupta start active espionage for Pakistan.“ She persistently denies any physical relations with her Pakistani handler or any regular money payments,” the source added.
HER GRUDGES
Run- ins with senior IFS- A grade officers on various assignments in foreign countries over the past three decades
The ministry of external affairs didn’t give her salary for over four years when she was on a study leave
The ministry also created ‘ unnecessary hurdles’ for her to bring her car to India after a UN mission in Africa