Soon after the Enforcement Directorate summoned and questioned National Conference president Farooq Abdullah in the J&K Cricket Association (JKCA) case, political parties have rallied behind the NC president.
“ED’s sudden summon to Farooq Sahab displays the extent of GOIs nervousness about mainstream parties in J&K fighting as one unit. Also, reeks of political vendetta and won't in the least blunt our collective resolve to fight for our rights,” said former chief minister Mehbooba Mufti.
“What a sorry state of affairs. Farooq sahib summoned by ED. Reeks of vendetta. Contrary to what they want to coercively achieve this will certainly have the opposite impact,” said Sajad Lone, chairman of Peoples Conference.
“Funny that even after arresting so many of us, imprisonment of an entire population, unleashing of all laws and brute force and failure in breaking people of Kashmir you still believe such actions will break us. With Abdullah,” senior PDP leader Naeem Akhtar said. The party spokesman described the summoning of Abdullah as “sheer intimidation.”
National Conference spokesman said after failing to politically fight party president Farooq Abdullah, the BJP has resorted to employing its agencies for the task. “The ED summons to Farooq Abdullah is clearly the result of the unity that Sahib has been able to forge among mainstream political parties in J&K. This is the price one faces when opposed to BJP’s ideology and divisive politics. Recent history is a witness to how BJP has been employing coercive and intimidating measures through various departments to target opposition leaders across the country. The recent ED summon to Farooq Abdullah is a case in point.”
“The timing of the recent summon is very clear. His previous summons was just before August 5 last year and today’s summon comes within days of forming the People's Alliance for Gupkar Declaration of which Farooq Abdullah has taken a lead,” the party spokesman said.
Last week Gupkar signatories formed an alliance at Farooq Abdullah's residence called Political Alliance for Gupkar Declaration. The alliance said it will fight for the restoration of Article 370 and the resolution of the Kashmir dispute.
The JKCA scam surfaced in 2012 when the police registered an FIR against the former treasurer of the JKCA Ahsan Mirza and the former General Secretary Saleem Khan, charging them with criminal breach of trust and criminal conspiracy. The charges against them were of diverting Rs 43.69 crore, received from BCCI as a subsidy, to three different accounts opened in the name of the JKCA by its officials. Abdullah was the JKCA president at the time.
The JKCA gets annual subsidies from the BCCI. The accounts were opened in the name of the JKCA in Jammu and Kashmir Bank and the BCCI funds were diverted to these “bogus” accounts and subsequently siphoned off.
In September 2015, Jammu and Kashmir High Court transferred the case to CBI for probe while indicting Jammu and Kashmir police for failing to carry out an investigation. Later in 2018, the CBI filed a charge sheet before the Chief Judicial Magistrate, Srinagar against four accused persons including Abdullah, who was accused of criminal breach of trust.
