Cuttack: The five DRDO employees, arrested in an espionage case, were receiving money in their bank accounts from foreign countries, police told the Orissa High Court Tuesday.
A division bench headed by Chief Justice S Muralidhar was hearing a PIL, seeking the transfer of the probe from the Crime Branch of Odisha Police to a national agency.
In its status report, the Crime Branch told the high court that the five contractual employees of the Defence Research and Development Organisation’s (DRDO) Integrated Test Range (ITR) in Chandipur were in touch with several women on various social media platforms, including Facebook and WhatsApp.
The locations of the women, however, are yet to be established, as per the status report.
The court had last month asked the Centre and the state government to file affidavits, informing the court of the current status of the investigation.
The Centre has not yet submitted its report, for which the court has fixed February 3, 2022, the next date of hearing.
In September, the police had arrested the five persons working at the ITR in Chandipur in Balasore district on charge of having links with a foreign agent, and supplying information to an enemy country.
Police had earlier said that they had found involvement of a female operative, suspected to be a Pakistani.
India evaluates performance of missiles, rockets and airborne weapon systems at the ITR, among others.
PTI
