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| How taxpayers' Rs 53 lakh was spent on NC's kitchen bribe scam | | | Early Times Report
JAMMU, Feb 28: Believe it or not but it is perfectly official that the State's poor taxpayers were made to pay an amount of Rs 52.96 lakh on winding up the ruling National Conference's in-house bribe scam involving three of the party activists---including the Chief Minister's so-called constituency representative.
In reply to PDP MLA Basharat Bukhari's un-starred question in Assembly today, Minister for Law Mir Saifullah revealed that the State government spent a huge amount of Rs 52.96 lakh on Justice H.S. Bedi Commission. The amount is incredibly stupendous when compared to the total expenditure made on other Commissions of Inquiry ordered since January 2009.
Minister said that the government spent Rs 9.55 lakh on Justice Muzaffar Jan Commission that initially carried out an inquiry into the death of two young women when many of the residents, including mainstream and separatist politicians, alleged that the duo had been "raped and murdered", in April 2009. However, Minister did not share with the House details of the money paid to the top Supreme Court of India lawyer Harish Salve who flies in his own helicopters and charges reportedly over Rs 10 lakh for each appearance.
Mercifully, Salve's job was restricted to ensure that the three Police officials arrested and detained in the case of "destroying evidences" did not get bail as that could intensify trouble in the South Kashmir district headquarters. Finally, all the accused were released and reinstated when CBI found no substance in the wide public allegations. It discovered that a group of local lawyers and doctors alongwith some civilians had created the fuss of rape and murder. During the exhumation, it found that even the unmarried young girl's hymen was intact and never violated.
Minister said in his reply that Rs 7 lakh was spent on Justice Y.P Nargotra and Justice Syed Bashir-ud-din Commission which was constituted to inquire into the death of 17 persons in the first few weeks of the street violence in 2010. He said that the inquiry could not proceed due a stay order from High Court. Presumably, more than Rs 50 lakh would have been spent so far had the High Court not granted the status quo.
Even about the R.C. Gandhi Commission, investigating the Kishtwar communal riots of August 2013, Minister said that Rs 6.87 lakh had been drawn as expenditure from the State exchequer. Getting extension after extension, Justice Gandhi has not been able to submit his final report, though in an interim report he gave clean chit to the NC MLA Sajjad Kichloo leading to his reinstatement as Minister of State for Home and Industries.
In the 12-month-long exercise, Justice Bedi proved that the NC activist Haji Yousuf had not been "killed by torture" at Chief Minister's residence or thereafter as had been alleged by the PDP and a few other political groups.
Remember that Haji died when he reportedly fell ill during his questioning at the CM's residence over his fellow NC colleague Yousuf Bhat's claim that the former had taken from the later around Rs one crore which was allegedly passed on to the party patron Farooq Abdullah with the assurance that Bhat would be nominated as MLC and subsequently inducted as Minister of State for Works.
Bhat had approached Chief Minister Omar Abdullah at Assembly Complex with the complaint that even after he had paid an amount of nearly Rs 80 Lakh, and the same had been accepted by Dr Abdullah through Haji Yousuf, he had been inducted neither as MLC nor as MoS. He obviously demanded the money back.
Enraged by Bhat's claim, Chief Minister asked then MoS Home Nasir Aslam Wani to carry both, Bhat and Haji, as also another complainant Abdul Salam Rishi, to the CM's residence and get them interrogated by then IG Crime Raja Aijaz Ali.
Even after the Abdullah family landed in a big trouble on account of Haji's death, Bhat was never expelled from the party. He did in fact lye low till he resurfaced as the Chief Minister's undeclared constituency representative. Reason was that the allegation of bribe taking was never investigated by any agency. When everyone focused on Haji's death, nobody stayed to see whether the money, as alleged by Bhat, had changed the hands or not. The result of the Commission of Inquiry is nothing except an unjustified expenditure of Rs 53 lakhs that could have been legitimately used to provide new transformers to 15 villages in Ganderbal. |
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