Kolkata: A Kolkata City Sessions Court on Friday sentenced three men convicted of spying for Pakistan and running a counterfeit currency racket to 10 years in prison, while a fourth accused was awarded five years’ imprisonment.
Among those convicted was Pakistani national Mohammad Ijaz. The other three — Afsar Ansari, Sheikh Badal and Mohammad Jahangir — are Indian nationals. Ijaz, Ansari and Jahangir were each sentenced to 10 years in jail and fined ₹5,000, while Badal received a five-year term.
Chief Public Prosecutor Dipankar Kundu said the accused have already completed their sentences during the course of the trial and are likely to be released. Ijaz will be deported to Pakistan following due legal procedures, he added.
On Thursday, Chief Judge Sukumar Roy had pronounced all four accused guilty.
The Special Task Force (STF) had arrested Afsar Ansari and his father, Irshad Ansari, in April 2015 for allegedly sharing sensitive images of the Kolkata Port with Pakistani intelligence agencies.
Investigators said Mohammad Kalam, alias Mohammad Ijaz, is an operative of Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) from Islamabad. According to the STF, he was trained by the ISI and travelled from Karachi to Bangladesh in January 2013 on a Pakistani passport. With the help of a Bangladeshi national identified as Prabin, he allegedly infiltrated India on February 9, 2013, and took shelter at Irshad Ansari’s residence in South 24 Parganas.
During the investigation, officials found that Ijaz had procured an Indian passport using forged documents. With his assistance, Afsar Ansari allegedly photographed key areas of Kolkata Port and prepared a detailed map. At the time, an Indian Navy warship was under construction at the port. The network is accused of transmitting the images, maps and warship design details to handlers in Pakistan.
Interrogation of the father-son duo led to the arrests of Sheikh Badal and Mohammad Jahangir, who were allegedly part of the espionage network. Authorities seized various documents and counterfeit currency worth ₹5 lakh from the accused.
Irshad Ansari died during the trial, and proceedings against him were subsequently abated.
