Haji Yusuf used to pay Rs 2,000 for mimicking Farooq Abdullah's voice: Aizaz Malik

SRINAGAR: In a fresh twist to the Haji Yusuf death case, Aizaz Malik, a mimic artiste, said in his confessional statement, that Yusuf used to pay him Rs 2,000 for mimicking the voice of Union Minister Farooq Abdullah to win people’s trust.

After being quizzed by the Jammu and Kashmir Police, Malik decided to record his confessional statement before a Magistrate in South Kashmir. Malik said he had been mimicking many politicians, including Farooq Abdullah, allegedly at the insistence of Yusuf.

In his two-page confessional statement, recorded under section 164 of the Criminal Procedure Code, the youth claimed Yusuf used to pay him Rs 2,000 for doing such a mimicry over phone. The mimicry used to help Yusuf convince people who had paid him for getting a ministerial berth or nomination to Legislative Council.

As per agency reports, Malik’s mimicry was recorded by the court which forms a part of the evidence . Malik had been receiving threats from some groups against deposing before the court, sources close to the development said.

The state police had put Malik, a 24-year-old South Kashmiri, on scanner after Yusuf ’s cellphone record showed that the two were in touch on a regular basis, the sources said on Sunday. Another person, Mohammed Yuusf Bhat, an eyewitness in the case, had also recorded his confessional statement before the Chief Judicial Magistrate (Ganderbal), Javed Alam.