Panel finalizes headquarters, boundaries, other issues
Call on Hill Councils to be taken up by Home Ministry
Sanjeev Pargal
JAMMU, Apr 2: The administration of Ladakh will be submitting recommendations of high-level committee on creation of five new districts to the Union Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) on or after April 15 after which a formal notification is expected to be issued taking number of districts in the UT from two to seven.
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Official sources told the Excelsior that the high-level committee has submitted its recommendations to the UT administration of Ladakh recommending headquarters and boundaries of five new districts including Sham, Nubra and Changthang (all in Leh district) and Zanskar and Drass in Kargil district.
“The Committee has also recommended structure of new districts as well as posts required for their creation,” the sources said, adding this was also the mandate given to the Panel headed by Retired IAS officer Pramod Kumar Jain and comprising Kacho Asfandyar Khan and Tsering Angchok as Members and the Deputy Commissioners of Leh and Kargil as ex-officio members.
The Committee which was constituted on September 26, 2024 exactly a month after Union Home Minister Amit Shah announced five new districts for Ladakh, submitted its report after six months task during which it met various stakeholders to elicit their opinion.
“After receiving Jain Committee report, the UT administration of Ladakh has assigned the task of analyzing the report and prepare proposal for implementation of recommendations by April 15. The recommendations then will be forwarded to the Union Home Ministry,” the sources said.
The Internal Committee is headed by the Administrative Secretary General Administration Department (GAD) of Ladakh.
The Home Ministry will issue formal notification for creation of five new districts notifying their headquarters, boundaries and other issues like creation of new posts. New administrative units will take number of districts in Ladakh from two to seven. Presently, Leh and Kargil are the only two districts in the UT.
Sham, Nubra and Changthang will take number of new districts in Leh to four while Zanskar and Drass will take number of new districts in Kargil to three.
However, the major task ahead of the MHA will be to take a decision on how to proceed with the structure of Ladakh Autonomous Hill Development Councils (LAHDCs). Presently, the two districts of Leh and Kargil have the Hill Development Councils with 30 Councilors each-26 of whom were elected while four others are nominated by the UT administration. Each Council has a Chairman and four Executive Councilors.
As five newly created districts will be small administrative units in terms of population, the MHA will have to examine whether the concept of Hill Development Councils will be feasible for the new districts or not. Moreover, some areas of Leh and Kargil District Development Councils will also become part of five newly created districts effectively reducing population and voters in the existing Councils, the sources pointed out.
“The MHA is expected to take a call shortly as elections to Leh Autonomous Hill Development Council are due in October this year,” they said. The BJP is in power for two consecutive terms in Leh Council. In fact, the BJP also won Ladakh Lok Sabha seat in 2014 and 2019 but lost in 2024 Parliamentary polls.
On the other, the Leh Apex Body (LAB) and Kargil Democratic Alliance (KDA) have been agitating in support of their four-point agenda including Statehood, Sixth Schedule status, dedicated Public Services Commission (PSC) and two Parliamentary seats for Ladakh.
Last meeting of LAB and KDA with the MHA was held on January 15 and since then there has been no further headway directly though backchannel talks were held earlier to reach a consensus on the issue of reservation for filling up of posts and PSC.
“Once the consensus is evolved on these two issues, the talks are expected to be held,” the sources said.
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