NSA invoked to get spy-who-fled Rabinder

Twenty months after Rabinder Singh fled the country, the Government has issued orders to detain the dismissed joint secretary of the Researc...

Twenty months after Rabinder Singh fled the country, the Government has issued orders to detain the dismissed joint secretary of the Research & Analysis Wing (RAW) as well as his wife, Pammi, under the 1980 National Security Act.

The NSA provides for detention of suspects who are considered ‘‘security risks’’ for the country for a year without a charge or trial.

Top Government sources told The Indian Express that the unprecedented action has been taken since the FIR in the case is still under examination by the Law Department and may still take some time to be filed.

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The sources said that the Delhi Police has been informed of the orders and top police officers briefed about the course of action, including attachment of Singh’s properties under Sections 82 and 83 of the Criminal Procedure Code.

‘‘This is the first of twin actions to be initiated against Rabinder Singh,’’ a Government official explained. ‘‘If he is not detained under the NSA, the Delhi Police will issue warrants of arrest and move for attachment of his properties.’’

The Rabinder Singh spy scandal was first reported in The Indian Express, days after he flew out of the country along with his wife via Nepal on May 14, 2004. The Government has since collected exhaustive documentary and video evidence against him.

The Indian Express had also catalogued the 15 properties owned by Rabinder Singh in Delhi, Gurgaon, Jalandhar, Shajahanpur and Bareilly.

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Intelligence inputs reaching New Delhi reveal that Rabinder Singh has been ‘‘spotted’’ in the US, where he is understood to have fled after a week-long stay in Nepal.

Ritu Sarin

Ritu Sarin is Executive Editor (News and Investigations) at The Indian Express group. Her areas of specialisation include internal security, money laundering and corruption. Sarin is one of India’s most renowned reporters and has a career in journalism of over four decades. She is a member of the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) since 1999 and since early 2023, a member of its Board of Directors. She has also been a founder member of the ICIJ Network Committee (INC). She has, to begin with, alone, and later led teams which have worked on ICIJ’s Offshore Leaks, Swiss Leaks, the Pulitzer Prize winning Panama Papers, Paradise Papers, Implant Files, Fincen Files, Pandora Papers, the Uber Files and Deforestation Inc. She has conducted investigative journalism workshops and addressed investigative journalism conferences with a specialisation on collaborative journalism in several countries. ... Read More

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