Many politicians also convert their membership at Joint Parliamentary Committees (JPC) into a money spinning opportunity. In both JPCs that investigated the scams of 1992 and 2001, certain members did not even bother to hide their 'affiliation' to specific groups.

The spy v/s spy game really comes into its own during times of intense corporate rivalry or in takeover battles. In the mid-1980s as a rookie reporter, I was startled when the chairman of a construction company coolly told me he had hired a detective agency to find out the sources of a colleague from a rival newspaper.

Twenty years later one has seen a whole set of battle strategies, from investors who grab the front row at general body meetings to embarrass or support management; or Special Purpose Investor Groups that spring up only during vicious corporate wars. Their job is to strive for a semblance of credibility while circulating dirt on one of the warring groups.

KPMG has even mapped the profile of this susceptible group as being male, between 26-40 years of age and with an annual income of upto Rs 2.5 lakh. But this profiling is unfair. The very fact of doing business in India sorely challenges the ethical moorings of every employee who has to deal with government departments or revenue agencies to get innumerable licences, permits and clearances or simply pay up statutory dues. After that, it is just another small step to accepting bribes to leak information about your own company.

Automation has added an entirely new dimension to corporate espionage. You no longer need to worry about photocopying bulky documents, since a nifty pen drive and some basic IT savvy will do the trick. Although large companies are now spending a great deal of time and money on systems to track possible leaks, most fast growing small and medium companies are reluctant to invest in security systems until they are actually confronted with espionage in the form of information on crucial bids.