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| Yes Minister, Early Times has no credibility! | | The magic of making millions on salary of Rs 40,000 a month | | Early Times Report
JAMMU, Feb 26: "Agar miani dasi aayi kaanh beqlaazi, khatta muaf karizem" (Forgive my lord please, if I have erred" was the stanza every individual in then Progressive Movement, and beyond, mugged up from Rehman Rahi's classical "Muafi Naama". Sher-e-Kashmir's National Conference conveniently dismissed Rahi as a frustrated Bakra (follower of Mirwaiz dynasty) and trashed his ode of satire. The tradition of intolerance in NC remains unchanged nearly 60 years later---'if you are not with me, you are against me'!
On Saturday last, PDP's Pluto did not carry ET alone to support and substantiate his chargesheet of corruption against the Navratans of Mr Clean. He did equally heavily rest on the Srinagar daily the Minister wouldn't dream to denigrate. 'The newspaper you are quoting is devoid of any credibility" decreed the Minister to silence the Pluto.
Not a single press release from the NC spokesman in the last over a decade is without extolling the party's achievement of giving "freedom to press platform". No less a person than Chairman of Press Council of India has now brought into question the NC-led coalition's intolerance to the fourth estate. The temple of democracy in session deserves to know what precisely has irked the Minister.
Men of stature in the coalition insist that the 'honourable minister' got exasperated when ET chose to be critical of his midnight press conference, held only to denigrate CRPF as "an unbridled force". ET's apprehensions came true when CRPF lost its morale at a crucial juncture in 2010 and soon the Valley's 13-year-olds began frisking passengers if any one of them was from 'Ponda Police'---a derogatory term coined by Police-protected separatist leaders to shatter the state police. Fatal casualties were less than 10 when the Minister bowled his full-toss. Soon the number spiraled to 110 in a geometrical progression.
Church Lane in the summer capital frowned but did not contradict when ET made a cursory reference to brazen corruption and wanton irregularities witnessed in Srinagar Municipal Corporation in 'selling' building permissions during the stewardship of Haq Nawaz. Without digging deep, the ET story restricted to the shopping malls and other commercial complexes coming up without an iota of regard for Master Plan and even without a provision for parking in the crowded Srinagar uptown. Feathers in the Church Lane ruffled on a passing reference to a palatial house being raised on a piece of notified land, just outside the first entry point of Srinagar Airport.
Rs 10 Crore palace, splashing on the slopes of Humhama Karewa, actually belonged to the 'Father of the City' and his father who on Saturday shouted on PDP's Pluto flush ET down the toilet. The Minister's whispering into the ears of Mr Clean continued inspite of the fact that ET did not reveal in detail how the Mayor put the Commissioner under pressure to issue permission of former's house in relaxation of all norms of propriety and moral binding. It did not even reveal how the poor politician, who earned livelihood out of petty R&B works and a tipper in Jammu in 1996, rose to become owner of this Rs 10 Cr property overnight. ET did neither ask how same politicians had raised not one but two palatial houses worth Rs 6 Crore at Roop Nagar and Sidhra in Jammu in six-year tenure as a Minister in 1996-2002. It did not either unwrap how contractors were subjected to extortion to raise a corpus for the food processing business the Minister's son-in-law. Not a question even on the fact of this non-government gentleman getting a Ministerial accommodation at Tulsi Bagh in Dr Abdullah's regime.
ET did not reveal how BOCA had issued the permission without a mandatory NOC from the Revenue authorities in Budgam. It was, in fact, a matter of investigation either for State Vigilance Organisation for J&K Accountability Commission to know how the NOC, if any, had been issued by DC Budgam for the structure proposed on a piece of notified land. Even today, owners of all adjacent premises are being denied NOC on the plea that the land stood notified and private houses and businesses would not be permitted so close to the hypersensitive Srinagar Airport and IAF base.
ET did neither investigate nor report when responsible citizens, including men in the government, brought to its notice that the same Minister was on a buying spree and had acquired over 50 Kanals of land at different spots on either side of National Highway Bypass from Nowgam to Bemina. It was, admittedly, partly due to the fact that the politicians' benami transactions are often subject of a laborious investigative exercise.
Even in the last one year, ET did not report how the Minister and his family members purchased 60 Kanals of an orchard, once owned by late Sadiq Ali's father, at Kikker Mode, Chondpora, on Budgam-Beerwah Road. When Tehsildar Territorial of Budgam, objected to illegal annexation and grabbing of 10 Kanals of Kahcharai land and construction of the boundary wall on the state land, he was publicly beaten up by the men at work. Even the senior Revenue authorities in the district did conveniently shut eyes. Emboldened by the administration's ignominy and silence, the owners demolished the boundary wall and raised it afresh well on the road. Now five huge godowns, being leased out to Food Corporation of India (FCI) and Department of Consumers Affairs and Public Distribution (CAPD), are nearing completion on the same lands.
This property, which was strategically acquired in the name of two non-descript individuals after the sale was settled through 'dalals' at Mughal Durbar restaurant in Srinagar, is currently valued at Rs 10 Crore. Who are the influential men behind, Mr Clean and his "generously equipped" Accountability Commission must find. They must, once for all, solve the riddle of a Minister's making millions and multiplying them on the monthly salary of Rs 40,000 a month. Oh yes, it has been hiked to Rs 90,000 a month since last year.
Yes, ET perhaps crossed the limits when it reported about the administrative Secretary of the same Minister that, with the advantage of the Minister's as well as Finance Minister's support of silence, he swindled a sum of Rs 26,000 from a public account and transferred it to his personal salary account on account of the expenditure on his purely personal visit to Chennai. Minister of Finance went on record to order an investigation and see how a Government official, responsible for giving legal opinion to the government, had himself indulged in embezzlement of the taxpayers' money for his personal luxury. The 'inquiry' is yet to see the light of the day.
Yet another matter of the same administrative Secretary was completely ignored and hushed up by the same Minister when ET reported how his poorly qualified son was being appointed as Public Law Officer despite the fact that he stood away from the cut-off fixed by Public Service Commission. Despite the detailed investigative story, carried by ET with clinching evidences and proofs of fraud, and without a line of clarification or rejoinder by PSC or the concerned department, the bureaucrat's son has been reportedly declared successful and appointed as PLO. In this matter too, where a father is issuing appointment order of his real son, this 'honourable Minister' has afforded to either lend his support or remain a mute spectator.
So, how can the ET be credible for this firebrand Minister? Since neither of the omissions and commissions of his department's administrative Secretary is benami, he must speak or else eat the humble pie. |
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