Excelsior Correspondent
UDHAMPUR, Mar 5: Accusing the Government of giving vague and nauseating slogans of good governance, transparency and accountability, Harsh Dev Singh, chairman-JKNPP and former Minister questioned the non-payment of compensation to the farmers whose lands and structures were acquired for construction of PMGSY roads since 2012 onwards.
He said that not only the marginal land holdings of farmers were expropriated for construction of rural roads without paying them any compensation but several structures and residential houses on the alignment of these roads were also dismantled without compensating the affected persons. He said that the poor farmers were made to shuttle from one office to the other without any relief thereby causing massive uproar in the affected areas. Harsh was addressing a press conference here today.
Seeking a probe into the misappropriation of funds, Singh divulged that the PMGSY Department had deposited compensation for houses and structures in 2012 for majority of the roads as per the reply provided in RTI applications, with the collectors and SDMs. It was however shocking to note that those payments had not been disbursed further to the affected land/house owners thereby suggesting embezzlement and diversion of the funds meant for rural poor.
Pointing towards another irregularity of grave nature in Power Department, Singh said that while the powerful and influential people were being ensured interrupted power supply despite pendency of huge power bills, the poor and indigent marginalized masses were being harassed with inflated billing and resultant power disconnections. He said that hefty bills were being sent to people in rural areas which did not conform to actual units consumed by them as per the meters installed by the Department.
“The state of affairs being pathetic, corruption having become all pervasive and slogans of transparency and accountability having been reduced to a mockery, the LG administration had surely rendered itself an object of contemptuous humorous disparagement in J&K,” asserted Singh.
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