Hussain's saffron link opens Pandora's box Meet : Talib, the ‘journalist’ with unusual access to BJP platforms

One of the pictures from Lashkar commander's Facebook account shows him seated on stage behind a person resembling the party's national leader Avinash Rai Khanna

A picture from the Facebook page of Talib Hussain Shah shows him (right) at the release of the Prime Minister’s  NaMo app in Jammu: Sourced by the correspondent

Muzaffar Raina   |   TT  | Srinagar   |    06.07.22 : The “Godi media” must be turning saffron with envy.

Jammu and Kashmir BJP chief Ravinder Raina on Tuesday reasserted that suspected Lashkar “commander” Talib Hussain Shah was never a member of the party and he gained access to the party while posing as a journalist.

Pictures on a Facebook page attributed to Hussain suggest the alleged terrorist had enjoyed access and pride of place on party platforms that even card-carrying members of the Godi media (a coinage to denote diehard Modi loyalists among journalists) club could only dream of.

Here’s a clue for the media loyalists who cannot figure out how Hussain managed what they could not — in many pictures the alleged bomber, who was arrested on Sunday, is seen wearing BJP mufflers.

Also, all the investments in dazzling studios and sharp suites are in vain: all you need is a “news” page on Facebook to rub shoulders with the high and mighty who run India.

Hold your breath and hear the name of the most influential news organisation in the nation: “News Sehar India”, the Facebook page run by Hussain and citing which he apparently shared camera frames with BJP leaders. If he had some other media connection, it is not known so far.

News Sehar India is different from a personal Facebook account on which he has uploaded the telling pictures.

One of the pictures from Hussain’s Facebook account shows him seated on a stage behind a person resembling BJP national leader Avinash Rai Khanna.

The person resembling Khanna is also present in a picture tweeted on Sunday by the Congress that features lookalikes of Union home minister Amit Shah and Hussain. Neither Amit Shah nor the home ministry has yet commented on the authenticity of the picture.

Khanna told this newspaper that he enquired from the office-bearers in Jammu and Kashmir and found out that Hussain gained access to him as a journalist of the News Sehar India Facebook page.

Raina, the Jammu and Kashmir BJP chief who flew back to Jammu on Tuesday after attending the party’s national executive session in Hyderabad, described Hussain as a Lashkar terrorist.

 “They (Hussain and his alleged associate Faizal Ahmad Dar) used to reach the BJP office pretending to be journalists. They would attend press conferences as reporters inside BJP offices and even at political rallies,” he said.

If true, the revelation speaks poorly of the security verification process in the country. It is not clear how national security adviser Ajit Doval would react to the claim that a potential terrorist can mingle with BJP leaders by merely posing as a “journalist” chronicling events for a Facebook page.

“Talib’s (the first name of Hussain) phone has shown photos and videos that are disturbing. It seems that Talib recced (reconnoitered) our BJP J&K HQ office and even sent them to people across the LoC to the LeT (Lashkar-e-Toiba). Security agencies are investigating the whole thing and can soon reveal some big links,” Raina said.

The BJP leader claimed that party leaders and office-bearers in Jammu and Kashmir were on Hussain’s hit list and sought an NIA probe into the incident.

Hussain was “never a member of the BJP, nor its primary member nor an active member”, Raina said.

Raina added that the BJP had issued a notice to its Minority Morcha chief Sheikh Bashir to clarify how Hussain was appointed by him as the Morcha’s IT cell chief without party authorisation.

“The letter regarding Talib Hussain Shah which mentions him as part of the IT cell has not gone from the party office,” Raina told a media conference.

“In BJP, if any person is given any responsibility, the electronic and print media get a mail from our office and then it appears in the newspapers. No such mail or press release has gone out from BJP office, nor any newspaper has carried any such news where the Minority Morcha has given an assignment (to him),” he said.

The Telegraph could not find any press release showing his appointment in the IT cell on May 9, as the letter by Bashir shows. But Jammu’s largest circulated newspaper Daily Excelsior carried a statement on April 24, 2020, on its web edition saying “Talib Shah” has been appointed as publicity secretary of the Minority Morcha in Jammu and Kashmir.

The statement claims Morcha president Sheikh Bashir had taken the decision in consultation with Ravinder Raina. The next day, Hussain uploaded a picture on his Facebook account showing him receiving a bouquet from Raina in his office.

When this newspaper tried to call Raina for corroboration, the phone had been switched off. Morcha head Bashir confirmed to this newspaper that the May 9 letter was indeed issued by him but he parried questions on whether it was signed by him in consultation with his seniors in the party.

“I have received a notice from my party and I have been given 48 hours to explain (about the letter’s contents). I will talk to you once I do that,” Bashir said.