Excelsior Correspondent
BILLAWAR, Apr 1: Turning the tables on Congress Party, Union Minister and BJP Lok Sabha candidate from Udhampur-Kathua-Doda Parliamentary constituency, Dr Jitendra Singh has accused the successive Congress Governments at the Centre and Congress-National Conference(NC) Governments in the State for having deliberately sabotaged major development projects of national importance in the Udhampur-Kathua-Doda constituency.
Dr Jitendra Singh, who addressed a series of largely attended Panchayat-level public meetings in the Billawar Assembly segment today, took a dig at the Congress leaders who are resorting to parrot-like monotonous statements on daily basis saying that they are unable to see any development in the constituency. The fact, however, he said, is that the number of development works done in the last five years is more than the works done in 65 years when the government was being run by Congress and its allies.
It is, on the other hand, for the Congress leadership to explain, said Dr Jitendra Singh, why the Shahpur-Kandi project had been dumped in cold storage for the last 40 years, even though the MP representing this constituency was a senior Union Minister at the Centre. He said, it is on record for anybody to verify that Shahpur-Kandi project was revived in 2017 after direct intervention by the Modi Government, following which a series of meetings were convened with Chief Secretaries of Jammu & Kashmir and Punjab State Government, and finally new DPR was prepared, and now the work is in progress with the timeline of completion within two years.
Making another dig at the Congress leaders’ propaganda that the region had been denied sufficient healthcare infrastructure, Dr Jitendra Singh said, this is actually a question which is to be replied by the Congress leaders themselves, because their Party MP from this constituency was Union Health Minister for years together, but the AIIMS and two Centrally-funded Medical Colleges in the constituency, namely in Kathua and Doda, were brought only during this five-year term.
The first session in both these Medical Colleges is likely to start this year, and the faculty staff has already been appointed, and these facts can be verified by the Congress campaigners who are unable to see anything because of their selective visual disability, he added.
Dr Jitendra Singh also mocked the Congress Party campaigners’ reference to their cultural legacy and asked, why they had never thought of river Devika in Udhampur which is not only an environmental issue, but also a matter of faith. He said, it was only in 2017 that river Devika in Udhampur was included in the National River Rejuvenation Plan (NRRP) with an allocation of nearly Rs.190 crore and the work on it has since started after formal launching by Prime Minister Narendra Modi during his visit to the State on February 3 this year.
Dr Jitendra Singh said, the Congress campaigners tell a lie every day and we would also refute this by telling the truth every day. He once again enumerated the important landmark development projects brought in the constituency during the last five years.
Also present in these meetings were prominent BJP leaders of the region, including Chairman Billawar Municipal Committee A.K. Basotra, Gopal Mahajan, Narayan Dutt Tripathi, Ravinder Pathania, Indrajeet, Ashanand, Amrik Singh, Kuldeep Abrol and others.
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