Maharashtra: Act is anti-national, says court

Pradeep Kurulkar

Pradeep Kurulkar was produced in court on Tuesday, and his custody has been extended until May 15. He has claimed that he had not visited any foreign country on his personal passport since 2021, and the visits that the ATS is referring to were on his diplomatic passport for official government events and meetings.

The ATS informed the court that they are examining Kurulkar's foreign visits to determine if he met anyone outside of his official list. According to government records, he has visited six countries on his diplomatic passport, including Nepal and Malaysia. Kurulkar was represented by Advocate Rushikesh Ganu, who argued that custody was not necessary to retrieve data from his electronic gadgets. Ganu expressed concern about what sensitive or classified information Kurulkar may have shared and whether the ATS was withholding that information.

Ganu also raised questions about the sequence of events leading up to Kurulkar's arrest. Public prosecutor, Advocate Vijay Fargade, told the court that new information had come to light, and they had received some primary reports of forensic analysis that needed to be investigated. Fargade explained that they needed to examine Kurulkar's bank statements and investigate the women who had met him at the DRDO guesthouse.

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Kurulkar's lawyer pointed out that the guesthouse records are maintained in a register and could be obtained from there, making custody unnecessary. The defence also questioned the ninth electronic gadget shown in the remand application and stated that the red iPhone seized by the ATS did not belong to Kurulkar. The ATS explained that the phone belonged to a witness who had received a message from the same number used by Pakistani intelligence to trap Kurulkar.

After hearing arguments from both the prosecution and the defence, the court extended Kurulkar's custody. The court stated that various witnesses had been examined by the ATS, and new facts had come to light during the investigation. The investigating officer had also retrieved data that had been deleted from Kurulkar's mobile phone, which needed to be examined. The court found the allegations against Kurulkar to be serious in nature and stated that he had shared images and data with foreign nationals, which was detrimental to national security. "This is an anti-national act on his part considering the post he was holding," the court said in its order while extending his custody. Therefore, the court ruled, that custody could not be denied at this stage.

During investigation, the ATS came to know that Kurulkar met different women at DRDO guesthouses all over India. Now, the agency is probing if the woman who seduced the scientist to retrieve classified information from him was in touch with the other women he met in India.