Mulayam An Isi Agent, Says Yashwant Sinha

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) spokesman Yashwant Sinha yesterday accused defence minister Mulayam Singh Yadav of being an agent of Pakistans Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency and urged Prime Minister H D Deve Gowda to call for the intelligence files and see for himself the remarks made against Yadav, particularly his close ties with a member of Nepals Parliament, Mirza Dilshad Beg.

Talking to mediapersons here, Sinha said: I am not mincing words. I am saying that Yadav is directly involved in the heightened ISI activities in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh. He has no moral right to be the defence minister owing to his close relation with the Nepal MP who plays a host to ISI activists in Kathmandu.

According to Sinha, whenever Beg visited Lucknow he stayed with Yadav which had been brought to the peoples notice by the media. Sinha said that the Prime Minister should sack a minister who is abetting ISI activities. But if the Prime Minister has shut his eyes then I do not have to say anything, he said.

The BJP leader said that Nepal has emerged as a centre for anti-Indian activities and maintained that the Centre was fully aware of it, but had not taken any step to stop this. I am sure that if the Centre takes up the matter with Nepal, it would definitely cooperate to check ISI activities.

When pointed out that the Centre has already formed a committee in consultation with its Nepal counterpart to collect information regarding ISI activities, Sinha said, Action should not be postponed on the plea of collecting more information. He said that there was no threat to the partys government in Rajasthan and hoped that the crisis would blow over. He said UF government was bent upon destabilising the BJP governments, but it would never succeed, he said.

Sinha expressed unhappiness with the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) for delaying the probe and said that the delay has caused immense harm to the poor state like Bihar. If the CBI has no proof against Laloo Prasad Yadav, it should have the courage to say so, he said.

Sinha requested the Supreme Court, the high court and the CBI to conclude the investigation at the earliest in the interest of the state.

The BJP leader and former finance minister also talked about the ongoing plan cuts and alleged that the CBI probe had badly affected governance.

He lamented that the Bihar government had spent only Rs 360 crore till December 1996 against the revised plan outlay of Rs 1,200 crore. The actual plan outlay for the current financial year was of Rs 2,600 crore.

Its interesting that the state finance commissioner instead of suggesting the Chief Minister to tide over the financial crisis is busy preparing papers and answers for the Chief Minister so that he could face the CBI, Sinha said.