By Binoo Joshi, IANS
Jammu : New revelations in the infamous Kashmir sex racket involving a cabinet minister and legislators of the ruling coalition partners have put the government here in a tight spot.
The much publicised scandal that rocked Kashmir last year resurfaced Monday with the Jammu and Kashmir High Court directing Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to re-investigate allegations against more than a dozen VIPs and report the process to the chief judicial magistrate within six weeks.
In its directives on a case filed by the investigative agency against the high profile suspects, including Transport Minister Hakeem Mohammad Yaseen and two former ministers and sitting legislators, Ghulam Hassan Khan and Yogesh Sawhani, the court reprimanded the CBI for not parading the accused before the victims for identification.
Yaseen heads Peoples Democratic Front (PDF), a group of independent legislators that supports the coalition government while Khan and Sawhani represent Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and Congress respectively.
For Chief Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad it’s a predicament whether to ask Yaseen – who is currently in Saudi Arabia on pilgrimage – to quit or allow him to decide on his own. Yaseen is likely to return by Thursday.
On the other hand, PDP has already suspended Khan from the party until investigations into the case are completed. “It will be only after the investigations that the next course of action would be decided,” PDP president Mehbooba Mufti said.
“It is a different matter as regards legislators. No one had asked them to quit the assembly, but it is difficult in the matter of a sitting minister,” says a source close to the chief minister.
If the ministers were asked to quit, the government would gain high moral ground but may lose a coalition partner. If it waits for the accused minister to respond then it stands to ridicule from the allies such as PDP and from the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Last year, during earlier investigations, then ministers Raman Mattoo and Ghulam Ahmad Mir were charged in the scandal. Both Mir and Matoo, Congress legislators, had given up their ministerial berths before being arrested.
Chief Minister Azad is in New Delhi and he is to take a decision regarding Yaseen in consultation with the allies and his own party high command, sources close to him said.
State unit president of BJP Ashok Khajuria has demanded dismissal of a government in which ministers, former ministers and top police officials are involved in a sex scandal.