Early Times Report
Srinagar, Jan 31: In a bizarre turn of opinion, ex-IAS officer Shah Faesal, on Sunday, lauded Prime Minister Modi’s ‘Mann ki baat’ saying that it was like ‘1.3 billion coming together as a family’. Faesal, who previously a harsh critic of the Modi government recently hailed the Centre’s vaccination program, calling India a ‘Jagat Guru’. Faesal who became first Kashmiri to top the Indian Civil Services Examination, had quit civil services and launched a political party - Jammu Kashmir People’s Movement (JKPM) in January 2019. It is like 1.3 Billion people coming together as a family on a Sunday morning and each one being heard and spoken to, each one feeling counted. Faesal was detained at Delhi airport in August 2019 and was initially taken to a makeshift detention center at the Centaur Hotel in Srinagar, but was later shifted to his home and was placed house arrest. On August 12, the J&K administration had issued a Look-Out circular against Faesal, which was challenged by Faesal in the Delhi High Court as ‘malafide exercise by the Centre’. The administration then slapped the PSA on him after former J&K Chief Ministers Omar and Farooq Abdullah, Mehbooba Mufti. Later in June 2020, Faesal along with PDP leaders Sartaj Madni and Peer Mansoor were released from detention. |
