Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Feb 11: PDP Legislature Party leader Mehbooba Mufti today said the people are protesting, the legislators are bleeding and Chief Minister Omar Abdullah is tweeting instead of attending the Assembly and addressing the problems highlighted by elected representatives of the people.
Speaking to media outside the Assembly and making a brief speech inside the House, Ms Mufti declared: “we will not allow the House to run unless and until our demands of inclusion of our areas in the list of the new administrative units are not met by the Government.”
The PDP today released a list seeking creation of more administrative units apart from 659 made by the Government.
An angry Mehbooba, reacting to the injuries caused to party legislators Mushtaq Shah in the Assembly, said: “people are protesting, legislators are bleeding and Omar Abdullah prefers tweeting. This is ridiculous. She added that comments by the Chief Minister on a serious issue through a micro-blogging site when the Assembly was in session amounted to contempt of the House.
“Instead of coming to the House, he prefers to tweet. He has said PDP MLAs should feel sorry. Sorry for what? He (Omar) should feel (sorry) as there was a suspicious murder of Haji Yousuf (NC worker) at his residence and JKCA scam involving Dr Farooq Abdullah,” she said.
Ms Mufti said: “they are behaving like animals with our honourable MLA. He did not carry a sword but was only agitating for inclusion of his area ignored by the Government in list of new administrative units. It is condemnable.”
The PDP leader said there is no fixed criteria for grant of these units and demanded that the Government should mention certain rules in this connection.
“They ignored the Ganaie Committee report…Did not discuss it in the House. And now, if they gave over 600 instead of over 222 units, what is the problem to include some more areas and put an end to protests in the areas?” she said.
Mehbooba said that during PDP-Congress regime, a Committee headed by S S Bloeria was constituted to identify deserving areas for the allotment of new administrative units.
“As recommendations of that Committee were incomplete, another Committee headed by Mushtaq Ahmed Ganaie was constituted”, she pointed out and recalled that the Ganaie Committee had submitted its report in the year 2011 but that report was never tabled in the House for discussion.
“A number of times assurances were given that report would be tabled in the House but no action was taken. Instead of tabling the Ganaie report in the House for the last 3 years, the Government abruptly made announcements in a hurried manner”, she observed added that a number of deserving areas were ignored by this Committee.
“Today people in every nook and corner of the State have been agitating as they feel discriminated with many deserving areas being left out,” she said and narrated a number of examples where deserving areas were ignored.
“At the fag-end of its tenure this regime has created chaos in the State by pitching one area against the other”, she lamented.
The PDP president handed over a list of areas, which deserve administrative units, to the Speaker in the House.
Ms Mufti regretted that braving severe cold, people all over the State have been protesting against discrimination in distribution of administrative units but the Government has failed to give any assurance on this issue.
Joining the issue with the Chief Minister, Mehbooba said that if Chief Minister thinks that by announcing 659 administrative units he can hide “misdeeds and misgovernance” of his five and half year tenure he should announce 700 more administrative units to get more political mileage.
She said that Omar Abdullah Government has miserably failed to fulfill its promises and, therefore, the Government has brazenly been indulging into such deceitful tactics to befool the people. “In its five and half year tenure this Government has nothing to show so this regime has been trying to divert attention of people towards its failure by politicizing the issue of administrative units”, she maintained and asserted that PDP would continue their struggle to get justice for the deserving areas.
Meanwhile, defending the administrative units set up by the NC-led Government, Minister for Planning and senior NC leader Ajay Sadhotra told reporters that the PDP is frustrated over the historic decision of Omar Abdullah.
“No area has been discriminated against,” he asserted.
NPP MLA and former Minister Harshdev Singh lambasted the coalition Government for neglecting the deserving areas in the matter of creation of new administrative units in the State.
Speaking in the Assembly, Mr. Singh said that there were several eligible areas which qualified the norms for grant of Tehsil, Sub Division and Block status but were “wrongfully and deliberately” deprived by the Government for political considerations. He said the Government has disregarded the criteria laid down for creation of such units particularly in opposition constituencies with “vested interests and ulterior motives”.
Mr Singh said that the reports of Ganaie Committee as well as the CSC reports were assured to be tabled on the floor of the Assembly for discussion but the Government refused to honour its assurance for obvious reasons. He said that the Government was aware of irregularities and imbalances in the said reports and therefore avoided the tabling of the report in Assembly for discussion.
Making out a strong case for grant of tehsil status to Jandrah, Mr. Singh said that Jandrah niabat was created around 40 years back and had been recommended for tehsil status even in Wazir Commission report.
Likewise, Mr Singh pleaded the cause of Purmandal, Duggan, Malhar and Budhal for tehsil status, Bishnah for sub division and Sudh Mahadev, Lowang and Sitti for block, Gadh Top and Kud for niabats.
Accusing the State Government of sabotage over the issue of Chanunta-Dalsar block, he said that its headquarter would be fixed by the people of concerned area. He warned the State Government to desist from misleading the people by naming any place as the headquarter of the said block.
Jammu State Morcha (JSM) MLA Ashwani Sharma demanded sub division status for Bishnah and warned that he wouldn’t tolerate any delay on this. He hailed the grant of one tehsil and one block to Arnia and called for sub division status to Bishnah.
BJP MLA Jugal Kishore said: “Jammu has been ignored in grant of new administrative units. Jandrah, which is a Niabat for past over 30 years, has not been made a tehsil. It is the biggest discrimination. House will run only after the ignored areas are included in the list.”
Hakeem Yasin, former Minister, called for a direction to the Government for inclusion of left out areas in the list. “A committee should be set up over the issue to decide the matter. Deserving areas were ignored. It has resulted in chain of protests,” he said.
PDP MLA Zulfikar said: “there are protests for past seven days in Darhal in support of the demands. The Government should address the demand.”
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