SRINAGAR, July 26: At least 10 top Kashmiri business houses engaged in overseas trade have come in for close scrutiny by investigating agencies for their alleged role in transferring foreign funds to Kashmiri separatists through hawala channels.

These agencies, which had so far been probing FERA violation charges against the Hurriyat Conference leaders without any clues, claimed a major breakthrough recently. They said they had traced an account at a local bank branch through which about Rs 1 crore was allegedly transacted on behalf of a senior Hurriyat leader within a two-year period.

A leading Kashmiri businessman, who made no bones about his links with the militants, had allegedly handed over the money to the said leader. Cases have been booked by the police against the businessman though he was released after a brief interrogation. It was from his Rawalpora house that the entire top brass of the outlawed Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF), including Yasin Malik, were arrested in 1990. It was a vegetable vendor who spilled the beans. Abdul Majid Dar, a 35-year-old shopkeeper in Rawalpora colony, confessed to the police that he was operating an account for senior Hurriyat leader Abdul Gani Lone at a local bank branch of the Jammu and Kashmir Bank through which about Rs 1 crore had been transacted over two years.

In an interview with The Indian Express, Dar said he was spotted by Abdul Gani Lone in front of whose house he had his shop. ``One day, Lone sahib collected funds from muhallawalas for the reconstruction of the Chrar-e-Sharif shrine and publicly announced that the money would be kept with me,'' Dar said. Dar was made to open an account at the Rawalpora branch of the Jammu and Kashmir Bank. The gullible Dar took it as a matter of pride for being chosen as the custodian of the `Alamdar fund' (the funds raised by the Hurriyat for reconstruction of Chrar-e-Sharif). The bank documents show that of the amount of Rs 1 crore deposited in the account, only Rs 30 lakh had been transferred to the `Alamdar funds' for which a separate account had been opened by the Muslim Augaf Trust reportedly under instructions from the Hurriyat leadership.

Dar could sign blank cheques and hand these over to Lone each time he asked for it. The police have seized all the bank documents and also questioned the officials. Dar became suspicious after reading about the investigating agencies' directions to the banks to furnish details about the accounts of the All Party Hurriyat Conference (APHC) leaders. In the meantime, Lone allegedly directed Dar to close the account. The police says with Hurriyat leader's political clout dwindling, they are receiving more voluntary disclosures about the ``benami bank accounts'' allegedly run on behalf of the Hurriyat leaders.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.