PESHAWAR: The Frontier Government’s announcement of a “heinous plot to murder the Frontier Premier, Khan Abdul Qayyum Khan, at the instigation of certain elements to prejudice Pakistan’s efforts in the Kashmir plebiscite” has created a sensation here. The police have foiled the attempt and arrested the plotters.

Among the seven Red Shirt organisation members arrested last night [March 13] is Khan Abdul Qayyum Khan Swati, who is a member of the Opposition in the Frontier Assembly. He is being treated as an “A” class prisoner. He had been attending regularly the current Budget session since March 7 along with three Red Shirt MLAs. Documents revealing Red Shirt correspondence with a certain “Pandit Sahib” are also reported to have been seized. Further arrests in this connectioned are expected to follow. [According to the communiqué,] …“it has been found that Red Shirts in Hazara District have been continuously passing information to the Indian Union and Shaikh Abdullah to ‘checkmate efforts of Pakistan to bring Kashmir within Pakistan’.

“The plot also aimed at committing the murder of the Frontier Premier. For both these purposes, money has been sent from India to Hazara Red Shirts… .”

Published in Dawn, March 15th, 2024