Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Feb 26: Minister of State for Revenue, Relief & Rehabilitation, Ajaz Ahmad Khan today said Government was serious to settle the issues of PoK refugees/ displaced persons of various categories.
Chairing a first interactive meeting of concerned officers and representatives of various refugee organizations here today, the Minister stressed the need for urgent redressal of issues confronting the refugee community. He asked the officers to complete all verifications and formalities in a time bound manner so that the records are prepared properly.
Mr. Ajaz directed immediate disbursement of cash relief in favour of 353 families of 1947 PoK refugees whose cases were found correct after verifications. He directed the Provincial Rehabilitation Officer to process the verification process of another 1075 unverified cases.
On the problem of urban displaced persons, the Minister was told that out of 148 cases received for plot allocations, 48 cases were found to have completed all formalities. He directed re-processing of all applications received till 2004.
Assuring the representatives of refugees of a humanistic consideration by the Government, Mr. Ajaz said completion of processes and formalities in this regard would be made time bound and even in the case of other issues matter would be taken up with Central Government also.
Asking the refugee representatives to co operate with the Government, the Minister appealed them to depoliticize their problems which he said are purely humanistic in nature.
Present in the meeting were MLC, Ravinder Sharma, former Minister, Manjit Singh, Financial Commissioner, Revenue, Dr. Arun Kumar, Commissioner-Secretary, Revenue, B. A Runiyal, Divisional Commissioner, Jammu, Pradeep Gupta, Deputy Commissioners of Jammu, Kathua and Samba and representatives of various refugee organizations.