Haryana travel blogger arrested for spying for Pakistan

The Haryana Police have arrested six people, including a Hisar-based YouTuber and travel blogger Jyoti Malhotra, on charges of spying and passing sensitive information to Pakistani operatives, officials said on Saturday.

These are the prominent arrests in Haryana in less than a week, after Punjab Police arrested two for espionage linked to the Pakistan High Commission arrest, after India and Pakistan agreed to a ceasefire.

Jyoti, who visited Pakistan twice in 2023, was sent to a five-day police remand. She was linked to a spy network in Haryana and Punjab.

Vikas Kumar, a spokesperson for the police, said officials are questioning her to gather details about the crime.

According to the first information report (FIR), the travel blogger visited the Pakistan High Commission in Delhi in 2023, where she came into contact with Ehsan-ur-Rahim, alias Danish, a staffer.

She has been accused of sharing sensitive information regarding Indian locations and was used to project Pakistan on social media in a positive light.

Danish, who has since been declared persona non grata by the Indian government and expelled on May 13, introduced her to multiple intelligence operatives based in Pakistan.

Investigators say she also entered into an intimate relationship with an intelligence operative and travelled to Bali in Indonesia with him.

During Danish’s stay in Delhi, she was allegedly in regular touch with him. During her trips to Pakistan, she reportedly met with Pakistani intelligence officers and began supplying them with sensitive information on Indian military installations and movements.

She allegedly used encrypted messaging platforms like WhatsApp, Telegram, and Snapchat to communicate and saved contacts of Pakistan’s ISI under fake names in her phone to conceal their identity.

Jyoti, who was running a YouTube channel named ‘Travel with Jo’, has been booked under Sections 3 and 5 of the Official Secrets Act and Section 152 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) on the statement of Sub-Inspector Bijender Singh in the Civil Lines Police Station in Hisar.

According to the police, Devender Dhillon, a resident of a village in Kaithal district, was also arrested on espionage charges. He is accused of providing strategic details, including updates on Operation Sindoor.

Earlier this week, Punjab Police arrested two people, including a 31-year-old woman, for their alleged involvement in espionage activities linked to an official posted at the Pakistan High Commission in New Delhi.

Those arrested have been identified as Gazala and Yameen Mohamad, both residents of Malerkotla in Punjab. Police teams have also recovered two mobile phones from their possession.

The development came days after Amritsar (Rural) Police arrested two people, identified as Falaksher Masih and Suraj Masih, for their alleged role in leaking sensitive information and photographs of army cantonment areas and air bases to Pakistan’s intelligence agency.

Punjab Director General of Police (DGP) Gaurav Yadav had said preliminary investigation has revealed that the arrested accused had been receiving payments through online transactions in exchange for sharing classified information.

They were in frequent contact with the handler and were involved in channelling funds to other local operatives as per his instructions, he had said.

The DGP had said this operation marks a significant step in dismantling cross-border espionage networks and reinforces the commitment to national security.

Senior Superintendent of Police Gagan Ajit Singh had said that acting on a tip-off off accused Gazala was arrested for leaking sensitive information regarding Indian Army movements to a Pakistan-based handler.

Based on disclosures made by her during interrogation, a second conduit identified as Yameen Mohamad was also identified and taken into custody, he had said.

Accused Gazala admitted that she was doing it in lieu of money, and the accused official has sent her Rs 30,000 in two transactions -- Rs 10,000 and Rs 20,000 -- via UPI, he added.