Mehbooba’s confidant eased LeT chief’s forced marriage with Pulwama girl: CIK’s chargesheet

New Delhi, June 9 : If the Counter Intelligence Kashmir (CIK) wing of Jammu and Kashmirs Polices Criminal Investigation Department (CID) is to be believed, the Peoples Democratic Partys youth president and the former Chief Minister Mehbooba Muftis confidante Waheed-ur-Rehman Para had developed and maintained an intimate liaison with the Kashmiri separatist leaders as well as the top commanders of the outlawed terror organisations Lashkar-e-Tayyiba (LeT) and Hizbul Mujahideen) all through the PDP-BJP government in Jammu and Kashmir.

In the CIK’s chargesheet, Para is alleged to have acted as a mole of the Pakistani establishment, two particular terror outfits and the pro-Pakistan faction of the Hurriyat Conference while being in the PDP government. According to the fresh chargesheet, he had not only provided huge amounts of money to the two terror groups for buying arms and ammunition but also pushed Hurriyat’s secessionist agenda and facilitated the LeT’s Kashmir operational chief Abu Dujana’s forced marriage with a Kashmiri girl in his home district of Pulwama.

Abu Dujana of Pakistan, who was killed in an encounter with security forces on 1 August 2017, had reportedly married a girl of Hakripora, Pulwama, with Para’s “blessings”.

“During investigation it surfaced that WRP (Waheed-ur-Rehman Para) had close links with two dreaded foreign LeT terrorists namely @ Abu Qasim and @ Abu Dujana and (he) had been meeting them through OWG Mohammad Yousuf Lone @ Yousuf Gadoora during the period of 2014-15 (Mufti’s government) and 2016-17 (Mehbooba’s government). As regards connection between WRP and Abu Qasim and Abu Dujana, there is an eyewitness to this (A1). Another witness (A-3 protected witness) has stated that there was a forced marriage of a girl with Abu Dujana by Yousuf Gadoora. Since it has been separately proved that Yousuf Gadoora was in close touch with WRP, by inference this forced marriage had the blessings of WRP”, says para-18 of the 19-page CIK chargesheet.

Dujana’s predecessor and LeT’s dreaded Pakistani commander Abu Qasim operated in the valley for a long time. He revived the LeT with fresh recruitments and scores of fatal attacks on the security forces and the civilian targets. J&K Police’s top most counterinsurgent Altaf ‘Laptop’ was trapped and killed by Qasim in Bandipora on 6 October 2015. On 28 October 2015, security forces and Police eliminated Qasim in a successful operation in Kulgam district of southern Kashmir.

The revelation of Para having passed an amount of Rs 5 lakh to Geelani through his son-in-law Altaf Fantosh, has been already made in a separate chargesheet by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) and has now been repeated by the CIK.

The CIK chargesheet, on the basis of a report from the Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL) claims to have accessed Signal exchanges between Para and some LeT commanders based in Pakistan. Quoting the data received on Para’s Apple phone, with BSNL SIM 9419000210, through the social networking app Signal, the CIK chargesheet says that the PDP youth leader continued to receive messages from the LeT terrorists in Pakistan even after his release from detention in the middle of 2020.

“The data retrieved from the cell phone of accused reveals that WRP has received messages from PAKISTAN numbers +92-2132270816, +92-3224408835 and +92-3369863038 on 26.10.2020 at 14:56:50 and 14:57:01 respectively on his cell phone No. 9419000210”, says para-25 of the CIK chargesheet with reference to the NIA chargesheet filed in March 2021.

The CIK chargesheet contains references to Para’s email exchanges with the senior Hurriyat leader G.M. Safi. A senior Jamaat-e-Islami leader from Baramulla, Safi has been operating from Pakistan since …