As New Delhi prepares to counter the FBI grand jury indictment alleging that Indian space and defence organisations illegally procured missile and navigation technology from the US, what is worrying South Block is the reference to two government officials in the “conspiracy.”

Responding to the report, first published in The Indian Express today, Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon said: “We are looking into the allegations. Now they are only allegations...we will get back to you when we have something to say about it.”

According to the grand jury indictment, the FBI has cited faxes, e-mails, telephone records and documents alleging that these point to involvement of Indian government officials — not identified by name — certifying the purchase of special microprocessors for the Tejas Light Combat Aircraft project.

The FBI has alleged that in February 2004, an Indian government official posted at the Indian embassy in Washington signed an “Inspection & Acceptance Certificate on behalf of the Government of India.” This certificate was meant for a vendor in Newburyport, Massachusetts, from whom Cirrus Electronics purchased the microprocessors.

Cirrus’s US head Parthasarathy Sudarshan and his colleague Mythili Gopal are now under arrest. These were the microprocessors allegedly delivered for the Tejas project to the Aeronautical Development Establishment (ADE) in India, the FBI says.

According to the indictment, “...he (Indian embassy official) attested that the vendor....had tested 380 i960 microprocessors and that 377 (of these) satisfied the criteria set forth in ADE’s purchase order for the items.”

Besides the embassy official, another official from the ADE has been cited as “co-conspirator.” Both these officials allegedly travelled to Newburyport for inspections and tests. The travel was arranged by Cirrus.

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