Neeraj Rohmetra
JAMMU, Mar 23: Even though the Congress and National Conference (NC) Ministers have burnt ‘mid-night oil’ to ensure constitution of new Administrative Units across the State in election year, the administrative machinery doesn’t seem to be sharing their enthusiasm to implement the decision on ground.
This became evident from the fact that despite clear directions from the Cabinet Sub-Committee (CSC) comprising various senior Ministers of the coalition to all Deputy Commissioners in first week of January, this year for demarcation of new Administrative Units, there is barely any response from the officials.
Reliable sources told EXCELSIOR, “the Deputy Commissioners were to demarcate the boundaries of newly created 659 administrative units and submit by mid-March the detailed report to the Revenue Department, which is the nodal agency for implementation of this decision”, adding, “no reports have been received from any of the 22 districts of the States”.
“The demarcation of boundaries is an important step and the entire planning would be based on the feedback obtained from all the districts. Once details are received from the respective districts, it shall be compiled and put before the Cabinet again for final clearance”, sources said adding, “in some areas like Doda-Ramban and Pulwama, there is also need to redefine the boundaries keeping in mind the concerns of the people”.
Sources said, “concerned over the delay in implementation of its direction, the State Government has asked the Revenue Department to issue fresh reminder to all DCs to expedite the process further”.
Pertinently, the CSC on Administrative Units besides Deputy Chief Minister, Tara Chand, who was the chairman included Higher Education Minister Mohammad Akbar Lone, Planning and Development Minister Ajay Sadhotra and Law and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Saifullah Mir, all from National Conference, Urban Development Minister Rigzin Jora and PHE, Irrigation and Flood Control Minister Sham Lal Sharma, both Congress and Agriculture Minister Ghulam Hassan Mir (DPN).
On February 1, this year the Cabinet Sub Committee (CSC) had recommended creation of about 659 new Administrative Units in Jammu and Kashmir including sub divisions, tehsils, blocks and niabats and make all 4098 Panchayats in the State co-terminus with patwar halqas, which means every Panchayat would have a patwar.
As per the official document, which was passed by Cabinet subsequently the Deputy Commissioners were to ensure that the newly created units are operationalised within a period of one month from the date of such creation in make shift arrangements, till necessary infrastructure was provided to the new units.
As per the earlier proposal, sources stated that the Deputy Commissioners were to ensure that the demarcation of new Administrative Units was done in such a manner that the people have easy access to them. The DCs and the Director Rural Development were to finalize the model estimates and designs for the construction of office buildings for new units within a period of four months.
The CSC had also directed the DCs to identify land for construction of newly proposed units and also as a short term measure identify places where the new units can be made operational.
The Committee had also recommended that the Finance and Planning Departments should arrange funds for making these units functional. After creation of 10521 posts required for the new units including 358 gazetted cadres and 10163 in non-gazetted cadre, the recruitment agencies were directed by the Government to make recruitment for these posts on fast track basis.
It is pertinent to mention here that the CSC under the chairmanship of Deputy Chief Minister and veteran Congress leader Tara Chand on February 1 had recommended creation of 46 new sub divisions, 131 tehsils, 178 CD blocks and 304 niabats in the State apart from making all 4098 Panchayats (2145 in Kashmir division and 1953 in Jammu division) co-terminus with patwar halqas.
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