Bharip Bahujan Mahasangh chief Prakash Ambedkar on Monday alleged that Union minister Rajeev Shukla had met India’s “Enemy Number One” in Pakistan on April 5, 2004, and discussed important security issues with him.
Mr Ambedkar produced a two-page document, which he claims was an internal report of the ministry of external affairs, to corroborate his allegation.
Though Mr Ambedkar did not specify who the “Enemy Number One” mentioned in the said report was, it is well known that the Indian security agencies use the phrase to refer to Dawood Ibrahim. Mr Shukla, however, rubbished the allegations.
As per the alleged confidential report of the MEA, Mr Shukla was part of the BCCI delegation that accompanied the Indian cricket team on the tour of Pakistan in 2004.
The document has details of Mr Shukla’s alleged meeting with “Enemy Number One” in Lahore, at the farm house of one Major Atik-ur-Rehman, who is to be an ISI operative and close associate of “Enemy Number One”.
Mr Ambedkar produced the alleged internal report of the MEA’s “G” Desk to corroborate his allegation, which states that Mr Shukla’s activities and movements were under the scanner when he travelled to Pakistan in 2004 as a BCCI delegate with the Indian cricket team, which went to play an ODI series with Pakistan at Gaddafi Stadium.
The document produced by Mr Ambedkar states, “Mr Shukla was at the stadium with the cricket team till lunch and slipped away from the stadium around 2.30 pm. He went to the farmhouse of Major Rehman, where ‘Enemy Number One’ was already present. Mr Shukla even handed some documents to ‘Enemy Number One’ and some copies of correspondence between Mr Shukla and the PMO was part of the said documents.”
An Indian agent codenamed FAE-31 was also present at the meeting and he later sent a detailed report to the MEA. According to FAE-31, Mr Shukla told “Enemy Number One” that only four RAW officers were posted in an Indian mission to snoop on underworld dons and hawala racketeers based in Pakistan.
“According to FAE-31, Mr Shukla told ‘Enemy Number One’ that he had written a three-page letter to PM and made a pointed reference to RAW’s non-planned expenditure having mounted to ‘700 crores and said that the agency presence in Pakistan is less than half of its sanctioned strength. He also told ‘Enemy Number One’ that to curb and control RAW’s operation in Pakistan he had demanded the institution of a Cabinet committee or a high-powered panel under the Cabinet Secretary to suggest its revamp,” the document states.
With regard to the confidential documents, Mr Ambedkar demanded that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh clarify whether Mr Shukla was authorised to meet the Pakistani military establishment.
Responding to these allegations, Mr Shukla said the report on the basis of which the allegations are being made is fake and bogus. “It’s a five-year-old allegation and he has been repeating it over and over again. There is no basis to his allegations. The documents, which he claims to have with him, are fake and bogus. It’s nonsense,” said Mr Shukla.