Two intelligence officers reporting to PMO shunted out for information leaks

Since it was created six years ago to prevent the kind of intelligence failure that led to the Kargil war, the National Technical Research Organisation (NTRO) has been in news for the wrong reasons: corruption and operational inefficiency.

Now comes another shocker: two of its senior officers, who report to the prime minister (PM), have been shunted out for allegedly leaking sensitive information.

It is not immediately known what kind of information was leaked. The officers shunted out are SK Sharma, a director, and Pawan Kumar, a deputy director in NTRO.

The chairman of NTRO, KVSS Prasad Rao, declined to comment. But sources say that pending inquiry, Sharma has been sent to Bangalore and Kumar to Bhubaneswar.

The NTRO was set up to keep pace with the latest intelligence gathering technologies. Initially it was planned as part of RAW. But it was decided that it should be directly under the PM, just as RAW is. To strengthen the NTRO further, the PM handed over RAW’s Aviation Research Centre (ARC) to it. The organisation is, however, yet to live up to its promise.

Recently, a senior NTRO official, during a visit to Washington, lost his laptop containing the nuclear programme details of neighbouring countries. Before that, a director in the NTRO’s missile monitoring division lost his laptop.

The PM was so upset with these incidents that he directed the chairman to hasten efforts to create the NTRO’s own cadre, rather than relying on officers on deputation from other organisations. At present, NTRO officers are drawn from various scientific institutions, RAW, Intelligence Bureau and state police.

Earlier this year, the NTRO got the dubious distinction of becoming the country’s first intelligence agency to be subjected to an audit by the comptroller and auditor general and an investigation by the central vigilance organisation. Then, it got mired in the telephone tapping scandal (the NTRO allegedly eavesdropped on the phone conversations of political leaders).