More dangerous than Jyoti Malhotra, how Madhuri Gupta, an Indian diplomat, ex-IFS officer, fell in love with a Pakistani man and…, she died after…
Recently, India was shaken by the arrest of Jyoti Malhotra, also known as Jyoti Rani, for allegedly spying for Pakistan and leaking sensitive military information. This incident brings back memories of a similar and shocking case from the past that of Madhuri Gupta, a senior Indian diplomat who was caught spying for Pakistan. Madhuri Gupta was a career diplomat, an Indian Foreign Service (IFS) officer posted as the Second Secretary (Press and Information) at the Indian High Commission in Islamabad. Her main job was to analyze local media and report back to New Delhi. With 27 years of service to the country, no one could have imagined that she would one day be accused of betraying her nation.
The truth came out about a year and a half after the 26/11 Mumbai attacks. Rajiv Mathur, who was the Director of the Intelligence Bureau at the time, received alarming information that someone in the Indian Embassy in Islamabad was leaking critical secrets to Pakistan’s intelligence agency, the ISI. Investigations revealed that the person in question was none other than Madhuri Gupta.
In early 2010, Indian intelligence agencies began closely monitoring her activities. To confirm their suspicions, they set up a covert operation where they deliberately fed her false information which she passed on, confirming her betrayal.
But why did Madhuri take such a drastic step?
According to investigators, she did it for love. Madhuri had fallen for a Pakistani man named Jamshed, or “Jim” as she called him. What she didn’t know, or perhaps ignored, was that Jim was actually working for Pakistan’s spy agency, ISI. While she was emotionally involved, he was using their relationship to extract sensitive information from her.
They concluded she was a victim of a honeytrap. “They threw a young man at her and she got trapped,” said investigating officer Pankaj Sood, speaking to The Caravan.
Madhuri didn’t just leak confidential documents she reportedly shared the names and email passwords of Indian intelligence officers working in Pakistan. Once enough evidence had been collected, officials called her back to Delhi under the pretext of preparing for a SAARC summit. There, she was detained and formally questioned. She was arrested on April 22, 2010, under the Official Secrets Act.
The court later stated that the information she passed on could have been extremely useful to India’s enemy. She was found guilty of leaking critical foreign policy details to Pakistan.
Madhuri Gupta was first charged in 2012 under Sections 3 and 5 of the Official Secrets Act, which carried a maximum sentence of 14 years. Initially, she spent 21 months in Tihar Jail before securing bail. In 2018, a city court found her guilty and finally convicted her of spying for Pakistan. Madhuri Gupta passed away in 2021 at the age of 64.
An alumnus of Jawaharlal Nehru University and a successful UPSC candidate, Gupta had served in various missions for India, including ones in Iraq, Liberia, Malaysia, and Croatia. Her posting to Islamabad in 2007 was, in part, due to her fluency in Urdu, crucial for monitoring Pakistani media.
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