In a statement to PTI, Dr. Rao says, “During their (Google’s) Mapathon 2013 exercise, they collected lot of classified data and we had approached them to refrain from doing so when we came to know about it.” The case has been registered by the Survey of India (SoI), which is the official mapping agency of India. Earlier in Feb-March 2013, the Internet giant, however, had abstained from seeking the SoI’s approval before holding a mapping competition, where people were told to map their locality, along with areas such as hospitals and restaurants in the vicinity. The case accuses Google of mapping several areas, which are not even comprised in the Indian maps. Until now, Google-India’s legal advisor Geetanjali Duggal and few others have been investigated by the CBI. On being asked, Google, however, assures its full cooperation to the CBI. Stressing on the breach to the home ministry, the SoI claimed to be the sole ministry to undertake ‘Restricted’ category surveying and mapping, with nobody licensed to do it- be it government or private firms. Moreover, according to the National Map Policy 2005, “the responsibility for producing, maintaining and disseminating the topographic map database of the whole country, which is the foundation of all spatial data, vests with the Survey of India”.
