Team News Riveting
Rajeev Sharma was contributing to China’s state-run Global Times when his transformation from a media-person to mole started about a decade ago.
He was a regular contributor in the newspaper that drew Chinese intelligence agencies to bet on him. Sharma’s articles in Global Times appeared regularly between 2010 and 2014.
Sanjeev Kumar Yadav, the deputy police commissioner of Delhi, narrated the sequences. After watching these articles, China’s intelligence agency Michael from Kunming city contacted Sharma and invited him to China.
Michael along with his colleague Xou asked Sharma to provide inputs related to India-China relations besides specific information about force deployment on China-India-Bhutan tri-junction, Doklam and India-Myanmar military cooperation.
The journalist, who had worked with many newspapers and agencies, was writing as free-lancer. He remained in contact with Michael and Xou between 2016 and 2018.
In January 2019, Sharma came in contact with another George of the same Kunming city who invited him to China. Sharma reportedly visited via Kathmandu and met George who was introduced as General Manager of a leading media house.
According to police, Sharma was offered to write on many issues including about the Dalai Lama. He was offered 300 American dollars for each article. Police said from January 2019 to September 2020, Sharma was paid Rs 30 lakh.
The money was transferred through shell companies. The police have arrested Qing Shi, Chinese national and Sher Singh of Nepal who were working for the company that is Chinese. The owners are reportedly in China.
The police official said during interrogation, Sharma had reportedly confessed his involvement in procurement of secret and sensitive defence related documents. He said he was in the process of transferring the documents to George and Michael.
