Former R&AW chief pens tell all on Vajpayee years
NEW DELHI: The Atal Bihari Vajpayee government had promised to elevate former J&K chief minister Farooq Abdullah as vicepresident in 2002 but reneged on the deal, a key official in the prime minister’s office at the time told a TV channel on Thursday.
Former R&AW chief AS Dulat, who was the Vajpayee PMO’s point person for Jammu and Kashmir, said on Karan Thapar’s “To the Point” programme on India Today that the agreement did not fructify as the BJP opposed vice-president Krishan Kant’s elevation to Rashtrapati Bhavan and backed APJ Abdul Kalam instead.
He also revealed that the Vajpayee gover nment had advised the Congress against l etting PDP patron Mufti Mohammed Sayeed become the J&K chief minister in 2002 when the two parties were attempting to stitch together a coalition government.
Dulat attributed this discomfort to the “grave doubts” the Centre had about Sayeed’s daughter Mehbooba Mufti’s reported links with militant group Hizbul Mujahideen.
In 2015, however, Dulat felt Vajpayee would have let J&K chief minister Sayeed give the Kashmir Valley a healing touch which Prime Minister Narendra Modi was “not allowing”.
In the interview ahead of a formal release of his book, “Kashmir: The Vajpayee Years”, Dulat offered insights into the functioning of the Vajpayee government.
He also mentioned that Vajpayee believed the 2002 Gujarat riots was a “mistake” and the grief was “clearly visible on his face. He spoke about a goof-up in the handling of the 1999 Indian Airlines flight hijack because no one wanted to take a decision and how a furious Farooq Abdullah almost decided to resign as J&K chief minister rather than release terrorists from jail to secure the passengers.
The retired spy also disclosed how the Intelligence Bureau (IB) head in Srinagar once helped Hizbul Mujahideen chief Syed Salahuddin’s son get admission into a medical school.
Dulat said Vajpayee and deputy prime minister LK Advani trusted each other but Vajpayee’s dependence on Brajesh Mishra, the PM’s principal secretary who virtually ran the government, was a sore point. Advani felt Mishra was more important than him.