NEW DELHI: Delhi Police’s preliminary investigation into the alleged leak of a pre-print copy of ‘Four Stars of Destiny’, the unpublished memoir of former Army chief Gen MM Naravane (retd), suggests it was not the handiwork of a suspected whistleblower but a coordinated effort to bypass clearance by the ministry of defence, an official said on Wednesday.Expanding the ambit of the probe, the special cell has since added the charge of “hatching a criminal conspiracy” to the FIR and issued notice to publisher Penguin Random House India, asking the firm to answer a set of questions.The probe is focused on the alleged sale or distribution of the pre-print copy in countries like the US, Canada, the UK and Australia. “The first leaks were allegedly uploaded to .io domain extensions of British Indian Ocean Territory. Thereafter, they found their way into several other hosting platforms,” an investigator said.Police are analysing the International Standard Book Number (ISBN), a 13-digit identifier visible on the leaked versions, and intend to quiz the publishers about it.”The publishers will also be questioned on why their statement on X came only after the registration of the FIR, and why they didn’t approach the police immediately after the leak was known,” the official said. Police said a PDF of the book, allegedly created by Penguin Random House India, was available on certain websites and some online marketing platforms displayed the finished book cover as if it was available for order. Penguin Random House India clarified it held sole publishing rights to the book and was yet to release it in any form.
