A man walks past the logo of Ola Electric
Credit: Reuters Photo
Bengaluru: A former director of Ola Electric Technologies Private Limited is accused of stealing sensitive company data.
Deepesh Rathore, who served as Director (Strategy) for five years, has been booked by the Southeast Cybercrime police under sections 66 (computer-related offences) and 43 (penalty and compensation for damage to computer systems) of the Information Technology Act.
The complaint was filed by Balachandra Datta, a senior executive at the Bengaluru-headquartered company.
According to the complaint, Rathore handled internal communications and financial affairs during his tenure from February 28, 2020, to February 6, 2025.
"During his employment, Deepesh had access to several confidential company data, including internal communications, financial documents, client information and product development details," Datta stated.
He is accused of illegally sharing internal and confidential information related to company's operations, finances and projects with outsiders. It also found that he forwarded company-related confidential data from his official email (deepesh@olaelectric.com) to his personal email (icwcontra@gmail.com) on November 18, 2024.
Rathore allegedly accessed and used digital insights from the internal 'InsightEV' web portal for his personal benefit, resulting in a serious data breach. The company has decided to initiate strict disciplinary and legal action against him, according to the complaint.
A police officer close to the investigation said detailed documents haad been sought from the company and that Rathore would soon be summoned for questioning.
This is the second police case against a senior Ola Electric executive in less than a month.
In October, Bengaluru police booked company founder and CEO Bhavish Aggarwal and senior executive Subrath Kumar Dash for abetment to suicide after a homologation engineer killed himself.
The engineer left behind a 28-page handwritten purported death note, alleging persistent harassment at his workplace. He was allegedly denied Rs 17.46 lakh in variable pay and incentives for two years, which was paid only two days after his death.
In an interim order, the High Court of Karnatkaa directed the police not to harass either suspect under the pretext of investigations.