According to the prosecution, the higher-ups in various departments were accused of passing secret information to the manager of a Mumbai-based company, Maneklal Industries, who allegedly passed the papers to the Swiss and German officials employed in embassies. Although the officials reportedly kept the original papers with them, photostat copies was provided to the conduit.

The list of accused persons included P. Gopalan, private secretary in the Ministry of Defence, and three more private secretaries of P.C. Alexander, the then private secretary to former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. Coomar Narain, the man receiving the documents and his boss,Yogesh T. Maneklal, were also named. Director to the Prime Minster's office, N.S. Sree Raman and Senior Administration Officer R.P. Dang were also named.

Fourteen years later, the case is far from concluded. The speed at which the prosecution witnesses have been recorded hitherto, it seems the case might just take the same number of years to finish. Around 188 witnesses were cited by the prosecution when the chargesheet was filed in 1985. Only 59 witnesses have been examined, leaving 129 more to be recorded.

Several developments have taken place during the course of this long trial. First, two of the 19 accused persons were discharged when the orders on framing of charges were passed. Later, a senior advocate and one of the defence counsels, K.K. Luthra, died. followed by another defence advocate as well as one of the accused.

Reeling under pressure, the sessions court trying the case has also witnessed a change of at least two judges. ``A new judge always takes time to peruse the case file. Moreover,it is an important case,'' said one of the defence counsels. Special Public Prosecutor B.R. Handa is, however, hopeful. Without commenting on the nature of trial, he simply said: ``The prosecution has done its best. None of the prosecution witnesses have turned hostile during the cross-examination. We have some more to go which will be completed soon.''

In the year 1984-85, intelligence reports with the Crime Branch said Coomar Narain, resident manager of Maneklal industries, was operating as a conduit on the instructions of his employer, Y.T. Maneklal. He had allegedly formed a network with government employees, attached with ``higher-ups'' in the government to procure certain sensitive documents.

Handa alleges:``The modus operandi of Narain was to entertain these officials and somehow receive the documents. On January 17, 1985, the Crime Branch officials conducted a raid on the premises of Narain's office in 3, Hailey Road. There, Gopalan was found with the original copy of classified documents.Further searches of the office led to the recovery of photostat copies of the documents, cash and wine. More arrests were made on the basis of Narain's and Gopalan's statement to the investigating agency.''

All the 19 persons were charged with criminal conspiracy and cases under various sections of the Officials Secrets Act. Confessional statements of the accused persons before the magistrate were recorded and placed in the court.Initially, quick dates were fixed. But as time passed, gaps between two dates widened. Where in the first year of the trial, around 19 witnesses were examined, in the next two years only 17 deposed before the court. In the following 16 months, 16 prosecution witnesses recorded their statements.