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Bitta Karate’s wife, Hizbul chief’s son among 4 J&K staff sacked for terror links
JKLF terrorist Bitta Karate said in an interview back in the 1990s that he killed many Hindus and Muslims when the militancy erupted in Jammu and Kashmir. In March this year, the trial for the murder of one Kashmiri Pandit, Satish Tickoo, finally started.
The Jammu and Kashmir administration on Saturday dismissed from service four employees, including Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) terrorist Bitta Karate’s wife and Hizbul Mujahideen chief Syed Salahuddin’s son, for alleged terror links.
Orders terminating their services were issued by the principal administration secretary. HT has seen copies of the orders.
Assabha Arzoomand Khan, wife of Farooq Ahmed Dar aka Bitta Karate, was a 2011 batch officer of the J&K administrative service, and Salahuddin’s son, Syed Abdul Mueed, was the IT manager at the J&K Entrepreneurship Development Institute. The other two employees, Muheet Ahmad Bhat and Majid Hussain Qadri, were employed as a scientist and assistant professor, respectively, with Kashmir University.
The four were dismissed under Article 311 of the Constitution, which empowers the administration to remove an employee without initiating disciplinary proceedings, a government functionary said, seeking anonymity.
“The Lieutenant Governor is satisfied after considering the facts and circumstances of the case and on the basis of the information available that the activities of Syed Abdul Mueed, Manager, IT, JKEDI S/o Syed Mohammad Yusuf alias Syed Salahudin R/o Soibugh, Budgam are such as to warrant his dismissal from service,” the order issued for termination of Mueed’s services stated.
“The Lieutenant Governor is satisfied under sub-clause (c) of the proviso to clause (2) of Article 311 of the Constitution of India that in the interest of the security of the State, it is not expedient to hold an enquiry in the case of Syed Abdul Mueed...” it added. Similar orders were issued for the other three employees.
The action against the four is part of a continuing effort started two years ago by the administration to identify employees linked to terror groups. So far, about 35 people have been removed from service for alleged links to terror groups and for working as overground workers for them.
It is unclear how Assabha Arzoomand Khan managed to stay under the radar so far, the functionary said. Her link to Karate was revealed only after a trial started against him.
Preliminary investigations into her background revealed that she was first hired by the Sher-e- Kashmir University of Agricultural Science and Technology in 2003. “Her appointment was made through the back door, and it appears to have been managed by someone in the administration,” the functionary said.
She was allegedly absent from work for months on end between 2003 and 2007, but no action was taken against her. “During her absence from work, she travelled to Germany, the UK, Helsinki, Sri Lanka and Thailand. Investigations revealed that she was working as a cash mule for JKLF, and while her departure was from airports, her arrival in India was mostly through the land route, from Nepal and Bangladesh,” the official said.
In 2011, she cleared the JKAS exam and married Karate, who in an interview three decades ago accepted killing many Hindus and Muslims when militancy erupted in Kashmir Valley.
Mueed also got his government job in suspicious circumstances, said the functionary.
“He was suspiciously appointed in 2012 as an IT consultant on a contractual basis. The rules were circumvented. His contractual position was subsequently converted into a permanent one. No mandatory CID verification was done in his case,” he said. CID is short for criminal investigation department, which typically vets the credentials of all government employees.
Security agencies have claimed that Mueed played a key role in offering logistical support to terrorists during attacks carried out in and around the JKEDI complex in Pampore. His two brothers, Syed Ahmad Shakeel and Shahid Yousuf, who had also got government jobs by allegedly circumventing rules, were dismissed from service last year and are now facing trial.
Kashmir University scientist Muheet Ahmad Bhat is accused of playing a key role in organising and funding street protests for years.
Bhat, who was with the department of computer sciences, was an executive member of the Kashmir University Teachers Association (KUTA) from 2017 to 2019 and its president from 2017 to 2019, said a second functionary privy to developments.
“He played a key role in organising student protests and street protests in 2016, in which more than a hundred died and thousands were injured. As a member of KUTA, Bhat distributed KUTA funds to stone pelters and some families of terrorists. In January 2018, he provided financial assistance to families of LeT terrorists,” the second functionary said.
Majid Hussain Qadri, the Kashmir University teacher dismissed by the government on Saturday, is alleged to have been working for terrorists for nearly two decades. Qadri came in contact with two Pakistan-origin Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorists in August 2001 and became the terror group’s points person in Kashmir University to carry out radicalisation and recruitment, according to security agencies.
“In 2002, he was tasked to act as an arms courier for terrorists. In 2003, he was assigned the position of spokesperson of LeT and continued till his arrest in June 2004. A sniper rifle was also recovered from him. He was detained under the Public Safety Act (PSA) for two years and subsequently acquitted by the court,” the second functionary said.
Qadri was acquitted because of “failure of investigation and prosecution”, he added.
“In March 2007, he was appointed as a contractual lecturer at Kashmir University. His case was never sent to the CID for character verification and he was appointed as an assistant professor at Kashmir university in 2010. He was presently working in the department of management studies,” the functionary said.
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) J&K spokesperson, Altaf Thakur, welcomed the decision. “Those people who work against the country have no right to be in government services...These people were working against the country so they have been sacked. A good decision taken by the government,” he said.
People’s Conference chairman, Sajjad Lone, hit out at the orders. “Every citizen of India has his or her own rights. A son cannot be held responsible for his father or wife for her husband or a father for his son. Sad - that kinship is used as a justification to sack people. This simply is not good. In all humility I register my disagreement,” he tweeted.
Apni Party asked the government to reconsider its decision. “Dismissing the employees on the basis of kinship is in no way fair. We live in a democratic country where every individual has the right of earning a respectable livelihood. We cannot punish one innocent for the sins of any kinship. Let the administration reconsider its decision,” party secretary, Muntasir Mohiudin, said.
