The man alleged to have dictated the abrupt transfer of SP of Jaisalmer, Pankaj Choudhary, is a powerful don, facing a spate of charges of involvement in anti-national activities for more than four decades. Meet Gazi Fakir, father of Pokhran Congress MlA Saleh Mohammed.
Sporting a beard, big moustache and dark glasses, Fakir looks every bit a don. The charges against him range from running a cross border smuggling racket to acting as an agent of Pakistan’s ISI.
“Fakir is facing charges of anti-national activities,” Pankaj Choudhary told a TV channel on Monday.Fakir has cocked a snook at law enforcement and Intelligence agencies for more than four decades and virtually controls the border areas of Pokhran. He entered the police’s history sheet in 1965, but thanks to his clout in the Congress party, no one has been able to touch him.
“My predecessors have made damning comments about Fakir in the files. I can’t go into details,” the SP said.Fakir’s first history sheet was opened in a case of cross border smuggling on July 31, 1965. No action was taken against him as the don’s close relatives controlled local politics.
The file against Fakir went missing in 1984. In 1990, the then SP, Sudhir Pratap Singh who opened the history sheet was also shunted out unceremoniously by the Rajasthan Government. On May 2011, the police again closed the history sheet. Then came Pankaj Choudhary, who also paid the price for trying to open Fakir’s history sheet.
The 79-year-old don’s anti-national activities are specifically mentioned in the book titled, Pakistan’s ISI: Network of Terror in India, by Srikanta Ghosh. According to the book, that cites the inputs of Intelligence agencies, Gazi Fakir is the Indian agent of Pakistan’s influential spiritual and political leader Syed Shah Mardan Shah-II, who is known as
Pir Pagaro.
Mardan Shah became the chief of Pakistan Muslim league — Functional (PMl-F) and spiritual head of Hur Jamaat.
In the early 60s, Intelligence agencies had alerted the authorities regarding Gazi Fakir’s role in cross border smuggling and in harboring Pakistani agents and spies.
“There has been marked increase in the politico-religious activities of the Tableeq-e-Jamaat, an Islamic organization in the border areas of Jaisalmer and Barmer. With the mushrooming of madrasas the influence of Mardan Shah is increasing in this region.
According to a report, Mardan Shah’s Indian agent, Gazi Fakir, a resident of Bagoon Ka Gaon, Jaisalmer district, is suspected to be helping the Pakistanis in trans-border activities and encouraging them to settle on the Indian side,” said the book.
The book also describes the clout of Gazi Fakir in politics and their role in releasing the spies caught by local police.
“In February 1984 the then Collector of Barmer district, CK Mathew had facilitated the arrest of one Mushtaq Ahmed of Burren-Ka-Tala under the National Securities Act. Though he claimed to be an Indian, he was carrying a Pakistani identity card. Subsequently it was found that he had undergone training in lahore for espionage. When arrested Mushtaq was bold enough to assert that he could not be held for long. Sure enough, his words came true when he had to be released under pressure from top Congress (I) leaders in the region,” adds the book.
