Quickly moving in for damage control in the Mufti Mohammad Sayeed coalition government, senior PDP leader and J&K Agriculture Minister Abdul Aziz Zargar resigned today after a key witness claimed that the Minister’s native residence was frequently used by militants including the two fidayeens who attacked the Akshardham temple last year.‘‘Yes, I have submitted my resignation to the chief minister,’’ Zargar said in a statement strongly denying the allegations that he had anything to do with the militants. ‘‘I decided to resign as a campaign has been launched against me. I don’t know of any conspiracy and the charges are baseless,’’ he said. The Chief Minister is yet to accept it.Zargar claims that he abandoned his native house in Munzgam village ever since militancy began 13 years ago and has not visited it since. ‘‘I do not occupy the house so it’s mischievous to talk about my links with militants who may have used it.’’ Whatever be the truth, it’s learnt that Zargar’s resignation came only after pressure from Mufti’s coalition partner, the Congress which is wary that ‘‘the allegations could be exploited (by the BJP) in the coming Assembly polls.’’ Mufti’s supporters tried to put a gloss on it by claiming that the resignation on this ‘‘moral ground,’’ would rob the Opposition of its thunder. That’s not very likely. Zargar’s name had cropped up during the interogation of Chand Khan, a motor mechanic who says he took the two fidayeens from Anantnag to Ahmedabad for the attack. Khan told the police that the militant commanders Abdullah Mansoor (who has already been killed) and later Sani and Zubair met him in Zargar’s native house at Munzgam village in South Kashmir. According to his interrogation report, Khan met the two fidayeens Abdullah and Shakeel in the same house where he also hid the weapons in a car.Zargar’s resignation may open the gates to many more questions. Sources said that Khan has told the police a lot more than just the meeting at the house. For example, Khan is said to have told the police how militants backed Zargar by attacking his opposition candidate from National Conference and former minister Sakina Itoo during the Assembly polls last year. In fact, the campaign for the polls coincided with the planning of the fidayeen attack in Gujarat. But this was apparently kept out of the interrogation report to save the Mufti government further embarrassment. In fact Zargar’s name also figures wrongly as Zaheer rather than Aziz in the interrogation report and mentions him as the MLA (member legislative assembly) and not as senior Cabinet minister.When contacted Itoo told The Indian Express: ‘‘I have been crying hoarse about Zargar’s links after he blatantly used his clout with militants to attack me and my house, threaten my workers.The only difference is that nobody listened to me. Now that a militant has confessed it, it has become news.’’ Itoo rubbished Zargar’s claim that he has never visited his native house in Munzgam. ‘‘His sons and daughters all live there. His son Manzoor - who is his PRO now - was there working as a contractor. Even his wife was there till he became a minister. They never migrated to Jammu,’’ she said.
