J&K Assembly Speaker gives notice to former Army chief

Jammu and Kashmir Assembly Speaker Mubarak Gul issued a notice to former Army chief Gen VK Singh to explain his position on his allegation of pay-off to a minister in the state.

Srinagar: Jammu and Kashmir Assembly Speaker Mubarak Gul on Thursday issued a notice to former Army chief Gen VK Singh to explain his position on his allegation of pay-off to a minister in the state.

"...He (Singh) has been asked to explain his position regarding certain revelations made by him during the course of an interview to a Delhi-based news channel on September 23," an Assembly spokesperson said. He said the notice has been issued in response to a privilege motion moved against him by 15 ministers and MLAs. Gen Singh has been given 20 days to explain his position in the matter so that further course of action could be decided under the rules of procedure and conduct of business in the J&K Assembly, the spokesperson said. Ruling National Conference ministers and MLAs had moved the motion against the former Army chief for alleging that some ministers in Jammu and Kashmir were paid money to get certain jobs done since Independence. Gen Singh had made the allegation while commenting on a report in an English daily, which had claimed that Technical Services Division, an intelligence unit of the Army created during his tenure, had paid Rs 1.19 crore to state minister Ghulam Hassan Mir allegedly to destabilise the Omar Abdullah government in 2010. While Mir denied any wrong doing, the Chief Minister wrote a letter on September 25 to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh seeking a credible probe into the allegation for restoring faith of people in mainstream politicians in the state.