Row over terror funding racket snowballs

The busting of an alleged ISI-sponsored terror-funding network in Madhya Pradesh has snowballed into a major political controversy, with senior Congress leader Digvijay Singh linking all the five suspects arrested in this connection to the BJP.

Madhya Pradesh Anti-Terrorist Squad (MPATS) had arrested five persons in Satna district on August 22, following specific intelligence inputs from the Intelligence Bureau.

They recovered mobiles with numbers of 20 Pakistani nationals from the accused.

The former chief minister has based his sensational allegation on the fact that one of the five accused, Balram Singh, had been arrested along with the then state BJP IT cell coordinator Dhruv Saxena in February 2017 for similar spying charges but got out on bail when Shivraj Singh Chouhan was the Madhya Pradesh chief minister.

Last week, Digvijay Singh tweeted, “BJP leaders arrested for spying for Pakistan’s ISI should get strict punishment under the NSA (National Security Act). Shame on you Shivraj, your disciples turned out to be Pakistani agents and you tried to get them out on bail. Who is the traitor?”

Following the tweet, Chief Minister Kamal Nath sought a report on how one of the arrested had managed to procure bail.

"The chief minister has sought a report on how terror funding accused got bail after their arrest in February 2017, and also on the measures taken (by probe agencies) to get the bail cancelled," Narendra Saluja, Nath's media coordinator, said.

Even as state BJP leaders chose to keep mum on the Satna arrests, Digvijay Singh fired another salvo on Sunday at the BJP accusing it of “taking money from ISI”.

Singh said, “Bajrang Dal, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) are taking money from ISI (Inter-Services Intelligence). Attention should be paid to this. Non-Muslims are spying for Pakistan’s ISI more than Muslims. This should be understood.”

Significantly, all five suspects held for terror funding are Hindus.