Pranab Mukherjee fears ‘bugging’ of his offices

It appears that finance minister Pranab Mukherjee last year wrote to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh about the possibility that his North Block office had been bugged.

According to a report in The Indian Express, Mukherjee wrote to the prime minister on 7 September 2010, asking him to institute a "secret inquiry" into what he called a "serious breach of security" in his office - the presence of "planted adhesives" in 16 key locations that suggested a possible surveillance attempt.

These locations included the office of the finance minister himself as well as the offices of his adviser and his private secretary, and two conference rooms used by the minister, including the main conference hall on the ground floor of the heavily guarded North Block.

However, Mukherjee mentioned in his letter that no "live microphone" or recording devices were found.

The report says that Mukherjee's letter came three days after an unprecedented "electronic sweep" of the ministry's VVIP chambers was conducted by a team of private investigators brought in by the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT).

There are two divergent views on the nature of the adhesives found. Senior Intelligence Bureau officials told The Indian Express that a government forensic lab concluded that these ''adhesives'' were a ''sort of chewing gum''. The IB's suspicion is on members of North Block's maintenance staff and the cleaning crew. The IB, however, is understood to have not submitted any written report on the episode.