Pranab's office comes clean, no 'planted adhesives' found

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Daljit Singh Bhatia

21 June, 2011

Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee's fears of having his office bugged came as a breather when the investigating agencies gave it a clean chit and ruled out the possibility of it being bugged.

THE INVESTIAGTIONS carried out by intelligence officials at Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee’s office did not end up giving any leads. Soon after the investigations were over, Mukherjee stated that In respect of news item regarding bugging in his office, the IB investigated into it and found there is nothing in it.

As per an investigation carried out by a leading newspaper on September 7 2010, Mukherjee had written to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh stating a possible security breach in his North Block office. He had also urged Singh to order a secret operation in his office so as to identify the ‘planted adhesives’ in his office as well as his adviser Manoj Pant and the two conference rooms used by the minister.

The issue came into light when security agencies conducted‘electronic sweep’ in the minister’s chambers led by the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT). However, post the recce conducted by the Information Bureau (IB), the agency retorted by saying that the ‘adhesives’ were just soft chewing gums to, which the CBDT retaliated by stating that the adhesives were bugs, which were pasted but were later pulled out.