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| Baig says ‘certain PDP leaders’ were aware of his attack on Omar | | ‘Two of my Cabinet colleagues influenced me to fire on Abdul Rahim Rather’ | |
Ahmed Ali Fayyaz
SRINAGAR, Sep 11: Putting speculations about his personal adventurism at rest, senior leader of the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Muzaffar Hussain Baig, today claimed that he had taken into confidence ‘certain leaders of my party’ in making an explosive attack on Chief Minister Omar Abdullah in the beginning of just-concluded Budget session of Legislative Assembly. He said that even in his earlier offensive on the senior National Conference (NC) leader Abdul Rahim Rather, it were two of the Cabinet Ministers of Ghulam Nabi Azad’s government who had influenced him to fire the salvo.
In Take One TV’s current affairs programme “Face To Face With Ahmed Ali Fayyaz”, which was telecast in Kashmir tonight and is scheduled to be telecast in Jammu early next week, Muzaffar Hussain Baig revealed that certain leaders in his party were well aware of his launching a serious attack on the Chief Minister during his much-demanded speech on the Shopian tragedy. “I won’t tell you how may of them were aware (of my intention) but it is a fact that I had taken certain of my party leaders into confidence”, Baig disclosed in the show. Without mentioning who were aware and who were not, Baig asserted that some of his party colleagues had no inkling of his plan to hit the Chief Minister.
Baig sought to make it clear that he had not leveled any personal allegation of Omar Abdullah’s involvement into the Srinagar Sex Scandal and asserted that had just taken a leaf out of the October 8th, 2006, judgment of Justice (retired) Bashir Ahmed Kirmani. When it was pointed out to Baig that neither of the two judges of the Division Bench of J&K High Court, namely Mr Justice Kirmani and Mr Justice Hakeem Imtiyaz Hussain, had anywhere in their judgments mentioned the names of Omar Abdullah or Dr Farooq Abdullah, he argued that Mr Kirmani had stressed on extension of the CBI investigation to a “shame list” that, according to Mr Baig, contained the names of “Cabinet Ministers and high ranking Police officers”.
Former Deputy Chief Minister, Mr Baig admitted that the names of Omar Abdullah and Dr Farooq Abdullah were neither among the 17 persons under prosecution in a District & Sessions Court in Chandigarh nor among equal number of influential politicians and Police officials Mr Justice Kirmani wanted to be arrested and interrogated. He said that in the wake of minor difference of opinion between the two judges---Mr Kirmani and Mr Imtiyaz---this matter was now before a larger bench of J&K High Court, headed by Chief Justice Barin Ghosh.
“Until the judgment comes (from the larger bench), investigation into the sex scandal is inconclusive. Until that time, both CBI as well as Home Minister Chidambaram are wrong to claim that that the investigation had been concluded”, Baig asserted. He said that most of the institutions had been discredited in the last two decades of militancy in Jammu & Kashmir but judiciary was one-odd institutions which had “some of the judges like Chief Justice Barin Ghosh” above board. Baig was optimistic that in both, Srinagar Sex Scandal as well as the rape-cum-murder of two young women in Shopian, J&K High Court under the leadership of Chief Justice Ghosh would deliver justice and strengthen the credibility of the institution.
Baig refused to discuss his accusation against the Chief Minister in detail with the argument that the Treasury Benches had moved a privilege motion against him. “Whatever I will have to say, I will say before the privilege committee. Defending myself outside the House on a TV channel would be deemed as a contempt to Assembly”, he said. When it was pointed out to Baig that none of the witnesses’ statements, recorded before a District & Sessions Judge, had anywhere a mention of men like Omar Abdullah and Farooq Abdullah, he said: “You keep your own material, I’ll keep mine”.
When he was further reminded that it was he who had said in his interview, published in Grater Kashmir of June 25, 2006, that the girls mentioning the names of Ghulam Nabi Azad and Omar Abdullah had no credibility “as they used to sell themselves for mere Rs 250”, Baig claimed that the names of the Abdullahs had come from “other sources”.
When it was pointed out to Baig that even the separatist Dukhtaraan-e-Millat Chairperson, Aasiya Andrabi---who repeatedly claimed in 2006-07 that she was in possession of a larger list---had just threatened to release it but had never mentioned any names, he quipped: “There’s a difference between Aasiya Andrabi and Muzaffar Hussain Baig”. “Ham jo baat kahte hain, kissi buniyad par kahte hain”, he added.
Had he not stooped to the level of NC’s MLA Nazir Gurezi (who retaliated with a list of the women Baig had been allegedly in liaison with)? “Poor Nazir Gurezi was just put on the front. I knew well that there was official machinery behind it. I knew the officers who fabricated it all overnight. I knew the people they were in touch (over phone) in New Delhi. But, I was well prepared for that as I had shaken the base of their regime”, Baid said. He claimed that he was not hurt by NC’s counter-offensive of escapades with a many women---“except the name of this one who tied this Rakhsha Bandhan (Rakhi) on my wrist”.
Baig, who held the second most important position in Ghulam Nabi Azad’s government, claimed that CBI had been stopped from proceeding against “very influential politicians, bureaucrats and Police officers” by top corridors of power in New Delhi for, according to him, they realized that laying hands on Cabinet Ministers and others would make the Indian system crumble in the militancy ravaged sensitive border state. He refused to listen that even in Srinagar Sex Scandal, CBI had arrested, prosecuted and jailed for nearly one year two of former Ministers, senior IAS officers and Police/BSF officials.
“I had high regards for CBI which had investigated Pathribal killings and submitted challan against Army officers. That is why I had requested Mr Azad to assign the investigation (of Srinagar Sex Scandal) to the CBI. But, I have strong reasons to believe that there was a highest level intervention in order to protect certain icons of mainstream politics in the national interest. Now I feel that the allegations of Mulayam Singh Yadav, Lalu Prasad Yadav and Mayawati (against CBI) were not without reason”, Baig said.
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