Former IB official, accused in ISRO spy case conspiracy, stopped from flying to London

Kochi, Aug 13

A former top IB official, who was flying to London with his wife, got a jolt on Saturday after checking in his baggage at the Kochi international airport, when emigration officials informed him that there is a look out notice against him issued by the CBI and hence, he cannot proceed with his travel.

Deeply hurt by this, K.V. Thomas who retired as an Assistant Director of the Intelligence Bureau after four decades service, said this was a cruel act as he was never informed about this notice and he will seek legal redress.

"I will approach the court to see that my travel ban is lifted and also for the grievous human rights violation. We were travelling to meet our daughter who is in London and we had paid Rs 3 lakh for our tickets," he said, adding "that this is the gift he has received on the eve of the country celebrating 75 years of Independence".

Thomas was briefly linked to the ISRO spy case, which surfaced in 1994 when senior ISRO scientist S. Nambinarayanan was arrested on charges of espionage along with another senior space agency official, two Maldivian women, and a businessman.

The CBI cleared him in 1995 and since then he has been fighting a legal battle against those he felt had framed him and last year the Supreme Court appointed a three-member committee headed by Justice D.K. Jain (retd) to probe if there was a conspiracy among then police officials to falsely implicate Nambinarayanan.

The apex court, which went through Jain's report, ordered the CBI to conduct a new probe and the agency registered an FIR against 18 people, including two top former Kerala Police officers.

The charges that have been listed against the ex-officers include conspiracy and fabrication of documents.

In 1994, Thomas was an IB official posted in Malappuram and was briefly involved in the then probe.