Sacked jawan had FB friends from Pak: BSF to high court
A SOLDIER IN UNIFORM ASSOCIATING WITH SO MANY FACEBOOK FRIENDS FROM AN “ENEMY” COUNTRY IS A MATTER OF SERIOUS CONCERN, BSF TOLD THE HIGH COURT
CHANDIGARH: The sacked Border Security Force (BSF) jawan, who in a video released last year was seen complaining about the quality of food being served to soldiers, had 18 friends from Pakistan on Facebook, the BSF has told Punjab and Haryana high court.
The BSF responded to the plea of Tej Bahadur Yadav, a Mahendragarh resident, who had hit the headlines in January last year when his video complaining about the “poor quality of food” at a BSF base near Line of Control in J&K’S Poonch went viral on the social media.
Yadav, who had joined BSF in 1996 as a constable, was dismissed in April 2017 after a probe indicted him in the viral video case. He had on January 30, 2018 approached the Punjab and Haryana HC seeking his reinstatement stating that the person who complained about food had now been deprived of food for lifetime.
He had also alleged that his plea against dismissal was rejected by director general of BSF in November 2017 without affording him the opportunity of fair hearing.
The BSF has termed the finding a serious concern. “There are many friends of the petitioner from various countries including Pakistan. Hence social media profiles of the petitioner were checked by the National Investigation Agency (NIA),” the BSF responded in the HC, adding that from their analysis of Yadav’s Facebook and Twitter profiles, it came to the fore that he had 2,941 friends many of whom were from countries including Japan, Canada, Russia, UAE and USA.
‘NO PROOF OF ANYTHING AGAINST NATIONAL INTEREST’
The BSF told the court that 18 of his friends were either from Pakistan or of Pakistan origin. “Although no proof could be made available in communication/post/chat of the petitioner that have been tracked on Facebook as well Twitter which could be harming in the national interest,” the BSF has told the court, adding that associating with so many Facebook friends from an “enemy” country by a soldier of a uniform was a matter of serious concern and it assumed more significance as his area of deployment was “very close” to the LOC, a hyper-sensitive area that is under close surveillance of the enemy countries.
As of his grievance on food quality and related developments, the court was told that his allegations were found false. “He did not utilise available tools and measures for grievance redressal mechanism in the BSF, but preferred to resort to preparing a video in the highly-sensitive deployment in the disguise of displaying alleged poor quality food, which tarnished image of the force,” the court was told.
The BSF has also alleged that his aim was to create sensation, which it said could have resulted in munity. He provided opportunity to enemy countries, which Pakistan used as a tool of a propaganda, the BSF said.