As the Compliance Directorate has attached properties worth Rs 11.86 crore to former Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah in connection with the investigation of suspected financial violations in the Jammu and Kashmir Cricket Association, Omar Abdullah said that his father is in communication with his lawyers and will fight against all these unfounded allegations.
“The properties attached are largely ancestral dating from the 1970s with the most recent one built before 2003. There can be no justification for the seizures because they fail the very basic test of having been acquired as the proceeds of the ‘crime’ being investigated. Dr Abdullah is in touch with his lawyers & will fight all these baseless charges in the one place that matters – a court of law, where everyone is presumed to be innocent & is entitled to a fair trial unlike in the court of the media or the court of BJP managed social media,” said his son Omar Abdullah
ED said “the property of Dr. Farooq Abdullah, estimated at Rs. 11,86 Crores, was attached under the PMLA. The attached properties include three residential quarters, one at Gupkar Lane, Srinagar; one at Tehsil Katipora, Tanmarg, and one at Bhatindi, Village Sunjwan, (Jammu); commercial buildings in the posh Residency Road district of Srinagar,” ED said.
Besides the lands at four separate locations in J&K, they were also connected. In the course of the inquiry, it is revealed that the house & property of Dr. Farooq Abdullah at Gupkar Road and the commercial buildings at Residency Road, at prime places, are essentially State land acquired by contract. It was also revealed that the annexed house at Bhatindi, Village Sunjwan, (Jammu) was built by Dr. Farooq Abdullah on the state property and the forest land where he was living. Between 2005 and December 2011, JKCA obtained funding totalling Rs 109.78 from BCCI.
Between 2006 and January 2012, when Farooq Abdullah was President of JKCA, he misused his role and endured unlawful appointments as JKCA office holder to whom he provided financial powers for the purpose of the laundering of JKCA funds. Investigation clearly indicates that Dr. Farooq Abdullah was instrumental as well as beneficiary of the JKCA laundered funds,” ED continued.
Despite the current daily bank account of JKCA, six new bank accounts were opened for parking and syphoning of JKCA funds. One dormant bank account in the name of JKCA’s Kashmir arm was also made operative for the same reason,” added ED.
In the course of inquiries so far it has emerged that JKCA funds have been syphoned to more than Rs. 45 Crores, which involves heavy cash withdrawals of Rs. 25 Crores, with no subsequent excuse. Investigations show that for the purpose of producing proceeds of crime, JKCA funds have been made up by means of complicated interbank transactions in all JKCA bank accounts and also by transfer to a variety of personal bank accounts, accompanied by syphoning of funds,” the Statemen stated. The JKCA provides annual subsidies from the BCCI. The accounts were opened in the name of the JKCA in Jammu and Kashmir Bank, and the BCCI funds were transferred to these “bug” accounts and eventually syphoned off.
In September 2015, Jammu and Kashmir High Court referred the complaint to CBI thus indicting the Jammu and Kashmir police for failure to launch an investigation. Later in 2018, the CBI filed an indictment against four accused people, including the Chief Judicial Magistrate, Srinagar.
The National Conference accused the government of using ED as a punitive measure to curb Dr. Farooq’s attempts to unite the mainstream political parties in J&K.
The party said the ED summons began after the Gupkar signatory formed an alliance at Farooq Abdullah’s residence called the Political Alliance for the Gupkar Declaration. The alliance said that it will campaign for the restoration of Article 370 and the settlement of the Kashmir dispute.
