Mohinder Verma
JAMMU, Jan 9: The ambitious scheme of Prime Minister Narendra Modi aimed at keeping the soul of rural India alive by ensuring holistic development has not been taken seriously by seven Members of Parliament from Jammu and Kashmir. Moreover, the State authorities have not shown any interest in constituting Empowered Committee to ensure implementation of scheme in its letter and spirit.
The scheme called—Saansad Adarsh Gram Yojana was launched by the Prime Minister on October 11, 2014 on the birth anniversary of Lok Nayak Jai Prakash Narayan. The basic objective of the scheme is to keep the soul of rural India alive while providing its people with quality access to basic amenities and opportunities to enable them to shape their own destiny.
Under this scheme, the Members of Parliament are required to identify one Gram Panchayat to be taken up immediately and two others to be taken up little later. Lok Sabha MP has to choose a Gram Panchayat from within his/her constituency and Rajya Sabha MP a Gram Panchayat from the rural area of a district of his/her choice in the State from which he/she is elected.
Primarily, the goal is to develop three Adarsh Grams by March 2019, of which one would be achieved by 2016. Thereafter, five such Adarsh Grams (one per year) will be selected and developed by 2024.
However, only three out of 10 Members of Parliament (six of Lok Sabha and four Rajya Sabha) have so far identified Gram Panchayats for development under the scheme of Union Government while as remaining seven MPs including one belonging to Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have yet not shown any interest in the scheme till date.
According to the official data of Union Government, Dr Jitendra Singh, Member of Lok Sabha from Kathua-Udhampur-Doda Parliamentary constituency, who is also Union Minister, has identified two villages Kalota-Malhori in tehsil Khillani of Doda district and Sangwali in Samba district for development under Saansad Adarsh Gram Yojana.
Similarly, BJP Member of Parliament (Lok Sabha) from Ladakh Thupstan Chhewang has selected Hanu Gram Panchayat in Khalsi block of Leh district. Likewise, National Conference Member of Parliament (Rajya Sabha), G N Ratanpuri has identified Newa Gram Panchayat in Pulwama district for development under this scheme.
Four Lok Sabha Members namely Jugal Kishore Sharma (BJP MP from Jammu-Poonch), PDP’s Mehbooba Mufti (Anantnag), Muzaffar Hussain Baig (Baramulla) and Tariq Hameed Qara (Srinagar) have not identified any Gram Panchayat for development under the scheme till date.
Three Rajya Sabha Members namely National Conference’s Mohd Shafi and Congress’ Prof Saif-ud-Din Soz and Ghulam Nabi Azad have also not taken the scheme of Narendra Modi Government seriously till date.
What to talk of seven Members of Parliament even State administration has not taken the scheme seriously which is evident from the fact that State Empowered Committee has not been constituted despite reminders from the Union Government.
Soon after the launch of the scheme, Secretary Union Rural Development Ministry vide D.O letter No.M-13012/3/2014 dated October 15, 2014 apprised the Chief Secretary of J&K about the launch of the scheme and even furnished guidelines.
Chief Secretary was conveyed that given the number of state schemes, which will be drawn into the fold of Saansad Adarsh Gram Yojana and the variation in implementation structures for different centrally sponsored programmes, an Empowered Committee should be framed.
Following no adherence, Union Joint Secretary on December 8, 2014 again drew the attention of Chief Secretary towards the communiqué dated October 15, 2014 and asked for immediate framing of the Empowered Committee under intimation to the Ministry.
Shockingly, the State authorities remained slept over the issue and taking serious note of this, the Union Joint Secretary on January 1, 2015 dashed a communiqué to Secretary, Rural Development Department, Shaffaat Noor Barlas. “The requisite information vis-à-vis framing of Empowered Committee is yet to be received from you as such you are requested to have necessary action taken urgently and ensure that the Empowered Committee is constituted and notified immediately”, reads the communiqué.
“This clearly indicates that no seriousness is being shown by the State authorities towards the ambitious scheme of Union Government”, sources said.
It is pertinent to mention here that the scheme is unique and transformative as it has a holistic approach towards development. It envisages integrated development of the selected village across multiple areas such as agriculture, health, education, sanitation, environment and livelihoods.
Far beyond mere infrastructure development, the scheme aims at instilling certain values, such as people’s participation, Antyodaya, gender equality, dignity of women, social justice, spirit of community service, cleanliness, eco-friendliness, maintaining ecological balance, peace and harmony, mutual cooperation, self-reliance, local self-Government, transparency and accountability in public life in the villages so that they get transformed into models for others.
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