NC’s ‘king maker’ dies in Crime Branch custody

PDP demands resignation of CM, MoS Home; CM announces judicial probe, shunts out security officers

Ahmed Ali Fayyaz

SRINAGAR, Sep 30: Death of a prominent National Conference (NC) activist, who was known for collecting huge amounts of money from political aspirants and had free access to top corridors of power, allegedly in custody of Crime Branch (CB) of Jammu & Kashmir Police has stirred a hornets’ nest in the summer capital today. Even as Government admitted that the NC activist had collected whopping sum of Rs 1.18 Cr from two other NC activists and a judicial inquiry was announced immediately, opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) demanded resignation of Chief Minister Omar Abdullah and Minister of State for Home, Nasir Aslam Wani, “to facilitate an expeditious and credible investigation”.

Authoritative sources disclosed to Early Times that one Syed Mohammad Yousuf S/o Syed Ghulam Ahmad R/o Loktipora, Bijbehara, died in mysterious circumstances at SMHS in the wee hours today. He had been called by Minister of State for Home, Nasir Aslam Wani, yesterday to reach Chief Minister Omar Abdullah’s residence “to settle a dispute” with NC’s Block President of Ganderbal, Mohammad Yousuf Bhat S/o Ghulam Rasool Bhat R/o Repora, Ganderbal, and another NC activist, Abdul Salam Rishi R/o Gul Mohammad Rishi R/o Akingam, Anantnag.

Earlier on Thursday, Yousuf Bhat had approached Chief Minister at his office in Legislative Assembly with the complaint that Syed Yousuf had taken from him an amount of Rs 84 Lakh with the assurance that he would be appointed as a Member of Legislative Council (MLC) to represent Panchayats of Kashmir division and thereafter inducted as a Minister of State. Abdul Salam Rishi too approached Chief Minister with the complaint that Syed Yousuf had taken from him an amount of Rs 34 Lakh with the assurance that he would be inducted as MLC.

Chief Minister, according to informed sources, learned that some officials from his personal security had granted free access to Syed Yousuf to all corridors of power from Chief Minister’s Secretariat to his residence on Gupkar Road “for dubious reasons”. He turned furious, called his close aide and MoS Home Nasir Aslam Wani with the direction that the matter be investigated “by this evening”. He was also directed to collect the money back in full, if the charge was established, return the same to Bhat and Rishi, hand over the accused to CB and ban the entry of all such persons of dubious antecedents to his office and residence.

MoS Home assured Chief Minister that he would obey strictly as desired by him. He called Syed Yousuf as well as both the complainants for resolving the crisis at CM’s residence in the evening. Syed Yousuf reportedly called on MoS Home at his official residence in Sonwar. He admitted to have collected money and assured Wani that he would return it in full to the complainants.

Even after the money was collected back almost fully from the accused and returned to complainants, MoS Home called IG Crime, Raja Aijaz Ali, to CM’s residence and handed over Syed Yousuf to him for further action and also to see if he had committed similar cheating with other people. Reports awaiting confirmation said that Syed Yousuf was beaten up either at CM’s party office or at CB headquarters. He began vomiting and was rushed to Police Hospital. Doctors referred him to SMHS Hospital where he remained under treatment for several hours and finally breathed his last in the morning.

While as many people believed that Syed Yousuf died due to severe beating at NC’s camp office, other were of the opinion that he died due to torture by interrogators at CB headquarters. IG Crime Raja Aijaz did not respond to phone calls. However, later this afternoon, an official spokesman claimed that Syed Yousuf “suffered a massive heart attack and expired”.

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