On CBI radar now, Satya Pal Malik ran foul of Modi govt some time back, recasts himself as farmer leader

The CBI on Thursday knocked on the doors of Satya Pal Malik, the charge in the case of former Jammu and Kashmir Governor being alleged corruption in a Kashmir Valley-based hydel project. Interestingly, the case only got registered after Malik himself made the allegation in a media statement in 2021, when he was the Meghalaya Governor, causing embarrassment to the BJP government at the Centre, as he pointed to the involvement of an RSS leader.

Malik, shorn of any constitutional position, has been making statements against the Modi government since then, ranging from grave allegations of the Centre trying to silence him on “lapses” that led to the 2019 Pulwama attack, to corruption in Goa (where he was Governor after his J&K stint). While critics claim these attacks by Malik, who was appointed BJP national vice-president in 2012 before becoming Governor, are informed by his desire to resurrect his political career in Uttar Pradesh, supporters say the Centre has been trying to muzzle him by instituting unfounded probes against him.

The 78-year-old veteran, who started his political career as a student union leader in Meerut in 1968-69, has been with an array of political parties through his long political career. He entered electoral politics in 1974, winning the Assembly seat from his native place Baghpat, on a ticket from Chaudhary Charan Singh’s Bharatiya Kranti Dal. He later followed Charan Singh into the Bharatiya Lok Dal, becoming its general secretary. In 1980, Malik entered the Rajya Sabha on a Lok Dal ticket. But in 1984, he joined the Congress, which sent him to the Rajya Sabha in 1986.

In the wake of the Bofors scam, he resigned from the Congress in 1987 and joined V P Singh. In 1989, he won the Lok Sabha election