Former diplomat Madhuri Gupta, accused of passing sensitive info to Pak's ISI, gets three years in jail

Former diplomat Madhuri Gupta, who had served at the Indian High Commission in Islamabad, was today sentenced to three years in jail by a Delhi court which convicted her for passing on sensitive information to Pakistan's ISI.

Additional Sessions Judge Sidharth Sharma gave her the maximum sentence for the offences of spying and wrongful communication of information protected under the law.

Gupta, who was the Second Secretary (Press & Information) at the high commission, was held guilty yesterday under various provisions of the Official Secrets (OS) Act.

She has been granted bail by the court to allow to appeal against the conviction and the sentence. While convicting her, the court had said that the e-mails "passed on by the accused were categorically sensitive information which could have been useful to the enemy country... and its secrecy was of utmost importance".

Gupta was convicted under Sections 3 and 5 of the Official Secrets Act which attract a maximum sentence of three years and fine or both.

She was also charged with the breach of trust, criminal conspiracy and various other provisions of the Official Secrets Act.

In the style of classic spy novels written by Messrs Forysth or Le Carre, she was a lone wolf who was honey-trapped by ISI and passed off information to her Pakistani handlers.

The court would hear arguments on the quantum of sentence to be handed down to Gupta tomorrow.

Gupta, who was the Second Secretary (Press & Information) at the Indian High Commission, was convicted under Sections 3 and 5 of the Official Secrets Act which attract a maximum sentence of three years and fine or both.

She was arrested on April 22, 2010, by the special cell of the Delhi Police for allegedly passing on sensitive information to Pakistani officials and remaining in touch with two ISI officials, Mubshar Raza Rana and Jamshed.

Here are 9 facts about her:

1) She worked in the media section of India’s high commission in Pakistan’s capital. Reports suggest she was handsomely compensated for her services by ISI and had been lured in by a classic honey trap.

2) She had been described as ‘brash and fearless’ and was looking forward to a plum diplomatic posing in London or Washington.

3) She worked with the Ministry of External Affairs for 27 years where her colleagues praised her ‘intellectual acuity’ and she also showed a keen interest in Sufism. She had also begun doctoral work on the Persian Sufi poet Rumi but never completed her PhD.

4) Prior to Pakistan, she was posted in Iraq, Liberia, Malaysia and Croatia. Her knowledge of Urdu was one of the primary reasons she was picked for her assignment. Her main job was to scan Pakistani media and make two daily dossiers interpreting the developments.

5) She came under the scanner six months into her posting. When she joined the service, she was desperate for a posting in Moscow, but she didn’t get her dream job.

6) She was seduced, it seems by one of her handlers was reportedly a man called Jim allegedly an alias for Jamshed. The chargesheet contains an email to that effect, which supposedly carries proof her of her romantic entanglement.

7) In fact, when New Delhi woke up to that the fact that she had ‘turned’, they false-fed her information. She was arrested when she returned to India, ostensibly to help prepare for a SAARC summit in Bhutan that year.

8) An investigatory officer told Caravan that Gupta ‘willingly’ disclosed details of her email account and allegedly even agreed that she passed information to Pakistan agents.

9) In an email, she wrote that she was bewafa (disloyal) that Jim had a ‘strong objection’ to her socialising with Pakistanis and wrote: “Till we are married and till I am in the present job I have to behave and live accordingly but Jim has strong objection to my socializing with any Pakistani. Why does he have such a poor opinion of his own people? In any job that I take up this attitude of Jim will be a big hurdle. I am not used to just sitting at home in purdah. After marriage he will neither socialize himself nor let me socialize with anyone.”