MUZAFFARABAD: Efforts being made by the Azad Jammu and Kashmir government to replace the chief secretary and inspector general of police came to nought after Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif told AJK Premier Chaudhry Abdul Majeed on Friday to wait for “improvement of situation with mutual accord”.
A 30-minute meeting between Mr Sharif and Chaudhry Majeed was held on the latter’s request at the PM House in Islamabad. Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan was also present at the meeting.
Before flying to Islamabad from Muzaffarabad, the AJK premier presided over an informal session of the cabinet, which “endorsed all of his decisions, mainly the one about the chief secretary and IGP,” according to ministers Abdul Majid Khan and Syed Azhar Gillani.
The cabinet members vowed that there would be no compromise on the “identity of state and authority of its chief executive,” they said.
According to an official handout, Chaudhry Majeed briefed Mr Sharif on the reasons that had “compelled him to surrender the services of chief secretary Khizar Hayat Gondal and IGP Malik Khuda Bakhash Awan to the Establishment Division” Islamabad.
He apprised Mr Sharif of the AJK government’s viewpoint on the deployment of Rangers during the recently-held by-election in Baloch area and the situation arising after it.
“On his part, Prime Minister Sharif maintained that there was no change in his feelings about the AJK government and added that for the betterment of the present situation in AJK, all issues would be resolved with mutual accord,” the handout said.
Earlier in the day, in his written response to the secretary of Establishment Division, the AJK premier reiterated his stance that “since both the officers had been found guilty of repeated misconduct and wilful disobedience of the executive authority and were illegally occupying their offices after being instructed otherwise, their posting orders should be immediately withdrawn and panels of suitable officers be sent for formal appointments as chief secretary and IGP”.
A source in the PML-N said that before Chaudhry Majeed’s meeting with Mr Sharif, PML-N’s AJK chapter president Raja Farooq Haider had also called on PM Sharif along with Chaudhry Barjees Tahir, federal minister for Kashmir affairs, to apprise him about the situation with the help of “documentary evidence”.
The duo held another round of meeting with Mr Sharif after the AJK premier had left the PM House, the source added.