Islamabad, April 9

Pakistan’s top investigative agency has approached the Islamabad High Court (IHC) to seek the cancellation of the bail of LeT operations commander Zakiur Rehman Lakhvi, the mastermind of the 2008 Mumbai terror attack.

The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) has filed an appeal in the IHC seeking cancellation of the post-arrest bail of Lakhvi.

Hearing the appeal, a division bench of the IHC on Tuesday asked authorities to provide the record of the Mumbai attack case in two weeks.

The record of the case is currently with an Islamabad-based Anti-Terrorism Court (ATC) which was holding trial of Lakhavi and other accused arrested in the case.

Seven LeT suspects–Lakhvi, Abdul Wajid, Mazhar Iqbal, Hamad Amin Sadiq, Shahid Jamil Riaz, Jamil Ahmed and Younis Anjum–are facing charges of abetment to murder, attempted murder, planning and executing the Mumbai attack since 2009.

The ATC on December 18, 2014, granted the post-arrest bail to Lakhvi and set him free. Lakhvi has been living in an undisclosed location since then.

The FIA, in its appeal, argued that it had enough evidence against Lakhavi and his post-arrest bail should be cancelled so that he could be re-arrested and probed.

“In the present case, the learned trial judge (of ATC) after the terrorist attack in Islamabad courts (of March 2013) refused to visit Adiala Jail for a long time due to security reasons,” the FIA said in its appeal against the ATC judge’s order, Dawn reported.

“Even the prosecutors of this case have been receiving threats through cell phones during the proceedings which were duly conveyed to the authorities concerned. The witnesses are also not secured, and reluctant to depose against the accused persons in the given situation,” it added.

The court after hearing the argument from the FIA and Lakhvi’s lawyer ordered to provide the record of the case in two weeks.

As many as 166 people were killed in the attack carried out by 10 LeT men. Nine of the attackers were killed by police while lone survivor Ajmal Kasab was caught and hanged after he was handed down death sentence by an Indian court.

The Mumbai attack case has entered into the 11th year but none of its suspects in Pakistan has been punished yet. PTI

Ishfaq Tantry
Tribune News Service
Srinagar, April 17

Amid mounting anger against the biweekly ban on civilian traffic on the national highway, the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) has ordered a probe into the incident involving the death of a cancer patient whose ambulance was repeatedly stopped during the convoy movement last week.

Despite orders to allow movement of ambulances during the ban, the driver of the vehicle carrying the patient to Doda after his discharge from a Srinagar hospital last Wednesday was stopped around 50 times on April 10, including a 30-minute halt at Lower Munda.

Abdul Qayoom Banday of Doda was stopped on the Srinagar-Jammu NH near Lower Munda in Qazigund area on April 10 for about 30 minutes by CRPF men.

Ambulance driver Javed Ahmad said the patient died near Batote. “Before that, our ambulance was stopped around 50 times between Srinagar and Doda.”

This is the first casualty due to the biweekly ban on civilian traffic on the 270-km Baramulla-Srinagar-Udhampur highway imposed on April 3. “A high-level inquiry has been ordered,” the CRPF said, expressing “anguish” over the demise of the  patient after a video of the ambulance being stopped surfaced on the social media.

The force said: “Strict instructions are in place to enable speedy passage of ambulances and ailing civilians.”

File photo of Anil Ambani.

New Delhi, April 13

France waived taxes worth 143.7 million euros to a French-registered telecom subsidiary of Anil Ambani’s Reliance Communications in 2015, months after India’s announcement of buying 36 Rafale jets, a leading French newspaper Le Monde reported on Saturday.

In its reaction, Reliance Communications rejected any wrongdoing and said the tax dispute was settled under legal framework which is available for all companies operating in France.

The French newspaper said the French tax authorities accepted 7.3 million euros from Reliance Flag Atlantic France as a settlement as against original demand of 151 million euros. Reliance Flag owns a terrestrial cable network and other telecom infrastructure in France.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi had announced the procurement of a batch of 36 Rafale jets after talks with the then French President Francois Hollande on April 10, 2015, in Paris. The final deal was sealed on September 23, 2016.

The Congress has been alleging massive irregularities in the deal, saying the government was procuring each aircraft at a cost of over Rs 1,670 crore as against Rs 526 crore finalised by the UPA government when it was negotiating the deal.

The Congress has also been targeting the government over the selection of Anil Ambani-owned Reliance Defence as an offset partner for Dassault Aviation, the manufacturer of Rafale. The government has rejected the allegations.

The French newspaper said the company was investigated by French tax authorities and found liable to pay 60 million euros in taxes for the period 2007 to 2010.

However, Reliance offered to pay 7.6 million euros only as a settlement but French tax authorities refused to accept the amount. The authorities conducted another probe for the period 2010 to 2012 and asked the company to pay an additional 91 million euros in taxes, the report said.

It said by April 2015, the total amount owed by Reliance to the French authorities in taxes was at least 151 million euros.

In October, six months after Modi announced in Paris about the Rafale deal, the French authorities accepted 7.3 million euros from Reliance as a settlement as against the original demand of 151 million euros.

A spokesperson of Reliance Communications said the tax demands were “completely unsustainable and illegal” and that the company denied any favouritism or gain from the settlement.

“During the period under consideration by the French Tax Authorities — 2008-2012, i.e., nearly 10 years ago, Flag France had an operating loss of Rs 20 crore (Euro 2.7 million). French tax authorities had raised a tax demand of over Rs 1,100 crore for the same period,” the official said.

“As per the French tax settlement process as per law, a mutual settlement agreement was signed to pay Rs 56 crore as a final settlement,” he said. PTI

Shubhadeep Choudhury

Tribune News Service

Kolkata, April 8

The BJP is getting jawans killed and then claims that their respect for the armed forces has no parallel, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said in an election meeting on Monday.

Mamata had questioned the timing of the Pulwama attack (shortly before the General Election) and why a large convoy of CRPF personnel was allowed to move on the highway despite the government having intelligence inputs about a possible terror strike.

Taking a dig at BJP’s high decibel “patriotism”, she said she did not need to learn patriotism from people who had a role in the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi and who never respected Netaji.

Mamata was speaking at Cooch Behar’s Ras Mela ground where PM Narendra Modi had addressed a rally yesterday. Referring to Modi as “ex-Prime Minister”, she said during his five-year tenure as the PM he did nothing other than dressing fashionably and touring various foreign countries.

Mamata said she would not have stooped so low as to launch personal attack against Modi had he also not paid scant regard to propriety while going after her in his speeches.

Extolling the virtues of religious harmony, Mamata said like a family consisted of various members, religions too co-existed in a “family of religions”. She added that she did not expect Modi to understand anything about family of any kind. “How can he (Modi) understand family? Has he ever seen one? One doesn’t need to go far. Has he seen his wife?” Mamata said.

Ridiculing Modi for promising people good administration, Mamata said Modi and Amit Shah were like “Duryadhana and Dushashan” — the two villainous brothers of Mahabharata.

She said if Modi became PM for a second time, money kept in banks by ordinary people would not be safe.

Same tricks don’t work twice: Maya

• Saying the same tricks won’t work twice, BSP chief Mayawati charged the BJP of failing to fulfil any of its poll promises
• The BJP should have released an action taken report on its previous election manifesto, she said. “But it does not have the courage to do so as the country is facing its worst days instead of the promised ‘achche din’,” she said

File photo of Christian Michel.

New Delhi, April 5

Christian Michel, alleged middleman arrested in the AgustaWestland VVIP Chopper scam, told a Delhi court on Friday that he has not named anyone in connection with the deal during investigation by the Enforcement Directorate, which has filed a supplementary chargesheet.

Michel, who alleged that the Central Government was using agencies for political agenda, filed an application after the reports appeared that ED in its chargesheet has named politicians of the previous UPA dispensation, defence personnel, bureaucrats and journalists as the beneficiaries of the controversial defence deal.

Michel’s counsel appeared with the application before Special Judge Arvind Kumar who issued notice to the probe agency and sought its reply by Saturday when he will take up the matter.

“Michel has not named anyone in his statement before the agency which is being leaked to media. This is only to make the matter sensational and prejudice the case against my client,” his counsel, Aljo K Joseph said.

He claimed the copy of the chargesheet, which was filed on Thursday, was provided to the media before it was provided to Michel.

He has questioned as to how the chargesheet was leaked to the media even before its cognisance was taken by the court.

The plea said that trial by a judge and free and fair trial rights override media rights and the court can temporarily curtail the freedom of the media to ensure that.

“The court is duty bound to balance it. Even to ensure a free and fair trail the court can temporarily curtail the freedom of media to ensure free and fair trial,” the plea said.

It further said that at the time of filing the chargesheet, the counsels for the accused had asked for supply of copies of the chargesheet, but it was objected to by the ED on the ground that the court has not yet taken cognisance of the chargesheet.

“Since this court is yet to take cognisance of the chargesheet, it appeared that the ED has clandestinely provided a copy of the same to the media houses, which were publishing the same in instalments only to sensationalise the issue and prejudice the accused named therein even before cognisance was taken by this court,” the plea claimed.

It said selective portions of the chargesheet have been published in the media which make it clear that the ED was not interested in a fair trial in a court of law but in a trial by media.

“The ED is making mockery of the judicial process resulting in complete travesty of justice. The extradition treaty prohibited the extradition of accused involved in the political offences and the government is now using the ED and all the investigating agencies for the political purpose. The supply of the chargesheet to the media houses is the best example of that,” it said.

The plea said that even though the court has not taken cognisance over the documents filed before it, in order to make the entire case a sensation again in the media, the ED had supplied the charge sheet to the media.

“The act of the prosecuting agency is highly condonable and contrary to the procedure established by law. It is pertaining to mention here that the prosecuting agency is acting as a weapon in the hands of the government and by clandestinely giving the documents to the media houses engineered in media trial with ulterior motives,” it claimed.

The plea further claimed that such hostile remarks might curtail the rights of Michel to a free and fair trial as he was a citizen of another country.

The ED had told the court on Thursday that Michel and other accused received 42 million euros as kickbacks in the defence deal.

The probe agency, in its 3,000-page supplementary chargesheet had also named David Syms, Michel’s alleged business partner, and two firms owned by them—Global Trade and Commerce Ltd and Global Services FZE—as accused.

Michel, extradited from Dubai in December last year, was one of the three middlemen being probed in the case, besides Guido Haschke and Carlo Gerosa, by the ED and the CBI.

On January 1, 2014, India scrapped the contract with Italy-based Finmeccanica’s British subsidiary AgustaWestland for supplying 12 AW-101 VVIP choppers to the IAF over alleged breach of contractual obligations and charges of paying kickbacks to the tune of Rs 423 crore by it for securing the deal. PTI

Bharat Ratna should be bestowed upon him for exemplary achievements

Maj Gen Ashok K Mehta (retd)
former GOC, IPKF, Sri Lanka

HAD Field Marshal Sam Manekshaw been alive, he would have been 105 years young today. He is a conspicuously eminent case of denial of Bharat Ratna.  ‘A nation that does not honour its brave is doomed to fail’ reads the epitaph on a plaque near the cricket pavilion at the Indian Military Academy, Dehradun.

It was the Indian soldier who stopped the Japanese onslaught in 1943 at the eastern gateway to India. It was near here that SHFJ Manekshaw took a hail of bullets across his gut to win an instant Military Cross (MC). He was so grievously wounded in the Battle of Sittang in 1942, and so spectacular was his bravery that Maj Gen Punch Cowan, thinking the wounds were fatal, pinned his own MC on Sam’s chest. This was only the beginning of a military career embellished with heroics, exceptional leadership and service before self. The Indian Army’s motto may have been reordered to ‘Nation First’, but the ethos, customs and traditions of sacrifice, putting one’s life on the line, a continuum with Manekshaw’s example, have endured. As he rose up the ladder of command, leadership and fame, his larger-than-life  image and  persona — popularised by his beloved Gorkha soldiers as Sam Bahadur — an unconventional style combined with a rare sense of humour and charisma, and with some histrionics slipped in, made him tower above other leaders.

Whether it was working in the sanctum sanctorum, Military Operations Directorate during the Kashmir war; stemming the tide of retreat in 1962 with his injunctions: ‘I have arrived. No more withdrawal’; holding the Eastern Front in 1965 War and defeating into abject surrender, the Pakistan army in 1971, were achievements of teamwork that only the ‘Manekshaw leadership’ style could produce. The idolised Manekshaw had become integral to the imagination of the military.

The 1971 victory was achieved against high diplomatic and military odds with at least three of the five permanent members of the UNSC championing Pakistan’s cause. After 2000 years of foreign rule, subjugation and the ignominy of the Panipat and Plassey syndromes, Manekshaw presented India with a clear and unambiguous battlefield triumph.

PM Indira Gandhi had a special fondness for Manekshaw as he could look her in the eye and call a spade a spade. She ensured he was awarded Padma Vibhushan and made a Field Marshal despite objections. She promised to make him CDS but the offer evaporated mysteriously. The popular thinking among the military and society at the time was that he richly deserved Bharat Ratna. If it was today’s surgical strikes era, it would have been a sure-shot.

Manekshaw was treated shabbily when he bade farewell to arms.  Defence Minister Jagjivan Ram had ordered that no one would see him off at the New Delhi Railway Station when a special train would take him to Mettupalayam en route to Coonoor in the Nilgiris. When he died in a Military Hospital at Wellington, no politician or service Chief attended his cremation. Some amends were made later when Defence Minister AK Antony presented himself at the Parsi cemetery at Ootacamund when his gravestone was laid next to his wife, Siloo.

To remedy the honour delayed, the Modi government — if it returns to power piggybacking the armed forces — should confer Bharat Ratna posthumously on Manekshaw. The country’s highest civilian award, Bharat Ratna was instituted in 1954 for exceptional service of the highest order in any field of human endeavour and national public service. In the list of 48 awardees are economists, artists, industrialists, politicians, sportsmen and members of socio-cultural organisation, but no one from the military. In the US, the highest civilian awards are the Congressional Medal and President’s Freedom Medal that have been awarded to civilians for exceptional achievements and have included several decorated Generals like Colin Powell, Peter Pace and Douglas MacArthur, along with icons like Mother Teresa.

A public petition to PM Modi (acknowledged by the PMO on August 11, 2014) by Rohinton Ranja, supported by thousands of Manekshaw admirers to award him Bharat Ratna was apparently closed in April 2015 without any reason assigned. When national security is Modi’s election battle cry, it is only befitting to revive the movement urging the government to honour Manekshaw’s outstanding contribution to the country.

On November 4, 2017, the Army Chief, Gen Bipin Rawat, after unveiling the bust of the late Field Marshal KM Cariappa (and Gen KS Thimayya), had this to say in response to a question on Bharat Ratna for Cariappa: ‘If others can get, I see no reason why he should not be a deserving personality for the same.’ I am sure General Rawat would immediately recommend Manekshaw for Bharat Ratna.

The nation went berserk when the IAF carried out the solitary airstrikes after 1971 at Balakot inside Pakistan. This achievement is a drop in the ocean compared to Manekshaw’s monumental feat of defeating the Pakistan army comprehensively. He bequeathed on India not just military victory, but split Pakistan into two, mitigating threat from Pakistan and corrected a cartographical incongruity which the erudite Army officer-turned-politician Jaswant Singh has called ‘geography taking revenge over history’. It is time for correcting history by awarding Manekshaw the Ratna. In doing so, the country will also be honouring the Sam Bahadurs of the military.

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, April 13

Panic gripped Ram Darbar after three live mortars were found lying in a heap of garbage in the area on Saturday morning.

Garbage collectors noticed the mortars lying near the vegetable market, after which various police teams rushed to the spot. Cops cordoned off the area and the traffic on the adjoining roads, including Ram Darbar-Poultry Farm chowk road, was diverted.

An earth mover was pressed into service to dig a pit to safely place the ammunition in it. The Army was also informed about the recovery of live mortars. An Army team later took the live mortars in its custody. A DDR has been lodged at the Sector 31 police station.

Priest with live cartridges caught at airport

Tribune News Service

Mohali, April 13

The police have nabbed a Barnala-based priest and spiritual guru, Gulam Haider Ali Quadri, with 13 live cartridges at the Chandigarh International Airport here today.

He was produced before a court, which sent him to 14-day judicial custody. He was sent to the Patiala jail.

Giving details, Inspector Baljeet Singh, SHO of the Airport police station, said Gulam Haider Ali Quadri was heading for Kolkata. While passing through the departure scanning section, the CISF detected ammunition in his baggage and detained the priest. Later, the police were informed about it. On checking the baggage, the CISF and the police recovered 13 live cartridges of .32 bore revolver.

Inspector Baljeet Singh said during preliminary interrogation, the priest claimed that he had a licensed revolver, which has been deposited with the police due to the poll code, and the cartridges were mistakenly left in his baggage. He said his weapon licence story had been verified and ascertained that he had deposited the weapon due to the model code of conduct.

The Inspector said even though the priest had a licensed weapon, they had to arrest him as he did not possess documentary evidences to support the ammunition in the baggage.

The police have booked Gulam Haider Ali Quadri under Section 25-54-50 of the Arms Act at the Airport police station, said the police.

File photo of Shah Mahmood Quresh. AFP

Islamabad, April 7

Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi on Sunday claimed that his government has reliable intelligence that India is planning another attack against the country between April 16-20, according to a media report.

Tensions flared up between India and Pakistan after a suicide bomber of Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Muhammed (JeM) killed 40 CRPF personnel in Kashmir’s Pulwama district on February 14.

Amid mounting outrage, the Indian Air Force (IAF) carried out a counter-terror operation, hitting the biggest JeM training camp in Balakot, deep inside Pakistan on February 26. The next day, Pakistan Air Force retaliated and downed a MiG-21 in an aerial combat and captured an IAF pilot, who was handed over to India on March 1.

Qureshi during a press conference in Multan said that the government has “reliable intelligence that India is devising a new plan”, Dawn newspaper reported.

“Preparations are being made, and there are chances of another attack against Pakistan. According to our information, the action could be taken between April 16-20,” the paper quoted Qureshi as saying.

“A new mishap could be staged…And its purpose will be to justify their [India’s] offensive against Pakistan and to increase diplomatic pressure against Islamabad,” he alleged.

“If it happens, you can imagine the impact of the occurrence on the peace and stability of the region.”

Qureshi said that Pakistan has already briefed the United Nations Security Council’s permanent members over the issue and stated Pakistan’s apprehensions.

“We want the international community to take notice of this irresponsible behaviour and reprimand them [India] for taking this route,” he said. PTI