What TV doesn't, print can't; we deliver.
What TV doesn't, print can't; we deliver.
Former J&K governor, Satyapal Malik, accused the Narendra Modi government of ignoring the Pulwama attacks
NEW DELHI: Former Jammu and Kashmir governor, Satya Pal Malik, made damning accusations against BJP government regarding their “inaction” in the Pulwama attack, in an interview with former Congress President and Wayanad MP Rahul Gandhi, in the run up to the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
“They (Modi government) ignored everything about the attack because they wanted to use it politically. I have never said and I am not saying that they got it done but they would say during elections that the people need to remember Pulwama when they go voting,” said Malik.
Alleging that around 12 quintals of explosives had been brought from Pakistan since getting these explosives shifted locally would ring a lot of alarms among security forces, the former J&K governor had also said that the security personnel had also seen the car multiple times in the area.
“The car had been on the road, taking rounds of the region for 10-12 days, loaded with explosives, as the 8 to 10 Link Roads along the 10 kilometres stretch had not been sanitised. Normally, a Gypsy jeep of the Kashmir police waits at these stretches to keep track of suspicious vehicles, as all civilian traffic is halted. Nothing of that sort had been done then,” he said.
Malik, who has made a significant volte face, however, at that time enjoyed the plum postings of gubernatorial posts in J&K, Goa and Meghalaya, the places where he served as governor. During an interview with the The New Indian’s Editor in chief Aarti Tikoo and Executive Editor Rohan Dua, in 2019, after annulment of article 370 in 2019, he had said ” Rahul Gandhi was ill-informed and used to run propaganda of across the border Pakistanis”.
Gandhi also illustrated that when the martyrs were brought to the airport for their final farewell, their arrival did not feel like a moment of mourning but a “big event”. “My security personnel had warned me against visiting the airport but I still went. When I went there, the security staff caught hold of me and locked me inside a room, telling me I could not go out,” said the Wayanad MP.
READ MORE: Rajasthan Polls: CM Gehlot’s son in ED net again
He added that he had to force his way out of the locked room to pay his respects to the “martyrs” in the massive “show” which was being attended by the martyr’s family, Indian Army personnel, and the PM.
Malik went on to claim that the central government had attempted to suppress his voice, alleging that during a phone call to the Prime Minister while he was at Jim Corbett National Park, Modi had instructed him to remain quiet.
On the other hand, the National Security Advisor, Ajit Doval, had also allegedly directed him to stay quiet. “Doval and I go way back, he was my childhood friend from a law school in Meerut, he had also called me up to tell me to stay quiet. I thought that it was about a probe but later, I realised that nothing happened. They were using it for votes,” Malik said.
READ MORE: The landmark October tribal raid that sealed Kashmir’s fate with India
“If the CRPF personnel would have asked me themselves to offer them a chopper, I would have given it to them. However, they had submitted a proposal four months before the tragedy to the central government, and for these months it lay on their table. Their plea was finally rejected,” he added.
