Documents which contain details of the "secret combat capability" of India's Scorpene-class submarines have been leaked.
Describing it as a "case of hacking," Defense Minister Manohar Parrikar said that he found out about the leak around midnight, and he had asked the Navy Chief to identify what exactly had been leaked. "First step is to identify if its related to us, and anyway its not all 100% leak," he told ANI on Wednesday.
The French government-owned ship building company DCNS is designing six Scorpene-class submarines for India at the price of 3.5 billion dollars. The ships are being built at at the Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders in Mumbai.
The Australian, which first reported on the leak today, said that more than 22,000 pages documents containing "the most sensitive combat capabilities" of India's submarine fleet, would be an "intelligence bonanza" for its strategic rivals China and Pakistan.
"The data tells the submarine crew where on the boat they can speak safely to avoid detection by the enemy," the report said.
The leaked documents contain details on frequencies at which the submarines gather intelligence, levels of noise the subs make at various speeds, diving depths, range and endurance, magnetic, electromagnetic and infra-red data.
It also contains specifications of the submarine's torpedo launch system, what conditions are needed for using the periscope, and the propeller's noise specifications. "It is unclear how widely the data has been shared in Asia or whether it has been obtained by foreign intelligence agencies," the report in The Australian said.
The Australian has seen 4457 pages on the submarine's underwater sensors, 4209 pages on its above-water sensors, 4301 pages on its combat management system, 493 pages on its torpedo launch system and specifications, 6841 pages on the sub's communications system and 2138 on its navigation systems.
The newspaper redacted some portions of sensitive documents from the leak which it posed online.
It is not yet clear whether this leak occurred on the Indian or French side, but The Australian suggests that it is most probably from France because the leaked documents also contains "separate confidential DCNS files on plans to sell French frigates to Chile and the French sale of the Mistral-class amphibious assault ship carrier to Russia." These projects are not in any way connected to India.
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