Islamabad, August 6:

Former Pakistan foreign minister Gohar Ayub Khan has said he will disclose “at an appropriate

time” the name of a former Indian Army officer who allegedly sold India’s 1965 war plan to his father Field Marshal Ayub Khan, but New Delhi already knows the person. Stating that he has already given a “clue” to the “clueless” Indian government about this man, Khan said the name of the person would not come as a shock to Indian authorities as they had already questioned the former officer. “I will disclose the name at an appropriate time,” Khan said. “The name will not be shocking for the Indians as they have already come to know about the person.” Khan claimed that after his revelation last month, the Indian government probed the person. “But they (Indians) do not want to name him,” said the son of the former Pakistan military dictator.

He said there would be plenty of hints in his book due to hit the stalls in December. “I will not disclose the name now, but leave clear clues for readers of my book.” Last month, Khan had alleged that a former Indian Army brigadier had sold the plan of the India-Pakistan war of 1965 to Ayub Khan for Rs 20,000. He said the deal was finalised and the money was paid to the former officer in London. The mysterious former Indian army officer, claimed Khan, was still living in India after retiring from a very high position in the army. But he claimed to have dropped a big hint to the Indian Army and others concerned in his seven-line statement to different newspapers Friday and said now “India can easily find him out”. The statement was in response to Indian Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee’s remarks in the Rajya Sabha on Thursday that the government had completed the probe into Khan’s allegations but found them “baseless” and an attempt on the part of the son of the former Pakistani dictator to sell his upcoming book.

Khan said in his statement: “The Indian Army and defence minister just cannot afford to destroy a legend of India by naming him to have sold for Rs 20,000 the Indian Army offence and defence plans when he was a brigadier working in the Directorate of Military Operations.

“(Mukherjee) had to whitewash the issue and draw a herring by stating on the floor of the Rajya Sabha that Gohar Ayub’s claim was an attempt to sensationalise events to promote the sale of his book due for release in December.” Asked how the “big clue” would be found in his seven-line statement, Gohar said the people concerned in India would easily understand the person he was talking about.