Tej Bahadur has 17% Pakistani friends on Facebook: Centre

NEW DELHI: Irked with continuous allegations of Constable

Tej Bahadur

Yadav and his family, terming them “baseless”, the government on Friday claimed that that the disgruntled

Jawan

’s friend list on Facebook has about 17 percent Pakistanis, which points fingers at his conduct while working for a border guarding force.

The government sources say that most of these Pakistani Facebook friends were there in his friends’ list much before he posted a video alleging bad quality food served by the Border Security Force.

Officials said that Tej Bahadur Yadav has over 3,000 Facebook friends, many from different countries including

Bangladesh

and others apart from Pakistan. A lot of people were added to his friends’ list after he raised the issue of bad quality food, which created uproar in the government, central paramilitary forces and general public. More than 1.2 lakh people also follow his Facebook account, especially after he took on the largest border guarding force.

“He was posted in a sensitive border post in Jammu and Kashmir and this kind of friend list talks a lot about his conduct in a disciplined force. His act has damaged the reputation of BSF with not an iota of truth in it,” said a senior government functionary in the North Block.

The BSF also aggressively replied to his wife’s allegations of her husband missing and that she was not in touch with him. BSF said that Tej Bahadur Yadav was in

Samba

battalion of BSF in Jammu and Kashmir and was not under any custody or arrest.

BSF officials also said that Tej Bahadur was in regular touch with his family. “He last spoke to his son, wife and brother between 6.40 pm and 6.46 pm on Thursday. Every day, he has been talking to his family over phone. The allegations of his family are a bundle of lies,” said a senior BSF officer.

Talking to reports in Jodhpur, BSF Director General K K Sharma said that Jawans should approach the internal grievance redressal mechanism of the BSF, instead of taking to the social media to voice their problems. Sharma said the jawans work in harsh conditions and their welfare is of utmost concern to the BSF, be it the quality of food, their physical and mental well-being, financial security or education of their children.

Tej Bahadur Yadav’s video had forced ministry of home affairs and

PMO

to seek a report from the BSF. The force has denied all the allegations regarding quality of food. Other central paramilitary forces have also conducted an audit of their food supply after the incident.