An Indian Navy sailor was arrested at the INS Agrani training establishment in Coimbatore on October 3 over allegations of sharing sensitive naval information with a suspected Pakistani intelligence operative, according to reports published on October 4. The New Indian Express’s Coimbatore report and a separate PTI dispatch identify the sailor as Pradeep Mukherjee, 31, and the arresting team as the Counter Intelligence Cell of Andhra Pradesh Police.
The reports say Mukherjee is from West Bengal, joined the Navy in 2014 and was posted under the Eastern Naval Command in Visakhapatnam. He was attending a management development course at INS Agrani, a naval leadership-training establishment in Tamil Nadu. He had reportedly been at the training centre for about a week when the Andhra Pradesh team arrived. His presence in Coimbatore was therefore for a course, according to the accounts, rather than a reported permanent change of posting.
The allegation centres on social-media contact that officials described as a honey trap. Unnamed official sources quoted by PTI said a woman believed to be a Pakistani intelligence operative had made contact with Mukherjee several months earlier. Investigators allege that the online relationship was then used to obtain sensitive information connected with the Visakhapatnam naval base. The sources do not establish the woman’s identity independently.
PTI’s account, carried by The Economic Times, says the suspected disclosures concerned naval assets, fleet movements and the base’s operational arrangements. These are broad categories in the reported allegation, not independently verified descriptions of particular files or movements. The reviewed material does not show what information was actually transferred, its volume, or a completed assessment of any resulting security damage.
The New Indian Express reported that investigators had detected suspicious online activity and obtained permission from naval authorities before making the arrest. It said Mukherjee was produced before a local court and then taken to Vijayawada for investigation. South First separately reported on October 4 that he had been moved there for questioning. This report dates the arrest to October 3; the following day’s publication is not a new arrest.
South First said formal details were expected after the inquiry and described a possible later National Investigation Agency role. That is a reported possibility, not confirmation that the NIA has taken over. The material reviewed does not provide an original Navy or Andhra Pradesh Police statement, the FIR, the precise charges, or the court’s transit or remand order. Those gaps limit what can be said about the legal proceedings.
No response from Mukherjee or his legal representative was available in the reviewed accounts. The report records an arrest and the authorities’ allegations, not a finding that espionage occurred or that the accused is guilty. The investigation’s reported next stage is questioning and examination of the alleged disclosures; no final investigative or judicial outcome is established here.