Punjab Police Arrest Army Jawan, Aide For Espionage Linked To Pakistan’s ISI

Chandigarh: In a major counter-espionage operation, Punjab police on Sunday arrested an Indian Army personnel and his aide suspected of spying activities linked to Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI).

Director General of Police (DGP), Punjab, Gaurav Yadav, said that the arrested accused have been identified as Gurpreet Singh alias Gopy Foji, a resident of Dhariwal village in Amritsar district - presently, serving in the Indian Army and posted in Jammu and his associate Sahil Masih alias Shali, also a resident of Dhariwal.

DGP Yadav said that preliminary investigation revealed that Gurpreet was in direct contact with operatives of the Pakistan ISI and is suspected of sharing sensitive and confidential information via pen drives. The key ISI handler involved in the case has been identified as Rana Javed, he added.

The DGP said that two mobile phones containing virtual numbers, reportedly used to communicate with ISI operatives, have been recovered from the possession of both the arrested accused persons.

Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP), Amritsar Rural, Maninder Singh said that accused Gurpreet who was recruited into the Army in 2016, systematically exploited his official position to collect, store, and transmit classified military information via pen drives.

The espionage network was reportedly facilitated by an acquaintance identified as Arjan, a Dubai-based drug trafficker from Dhariwal, who introduced Gurpreet to ISI operatives five months ago, he said, while adding that since then, Gurpreet has actively engaged in the unauthorised collection and relay of sensitive military data to the ISI using pre-decided drop locations.

The SSP said that in lieu of this espionage activity, accused Gurpreet was receiving monetary compensation through a complex financial network involving intermediary bank accounts of friends, relatives, and foreign associates to evade detection. Gurpreet and his associate Sahil Masih were nabbed while they were attempting another handover of sensitive data, he said.

It may be recalled that two YouTubers including Jyoti Malhotra and Jasbir Singh are among 12 people arrested by Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh police over the past few weeks on the charges of espionage.

(Except for the headline, this article has not been edited by FPJ's editorial team and is auto-generated from an agency feed.)

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