Suhail Bhat
Srinagar, Apr 15: The order passed by former Lieutenant Governor of Jammu and Kashmir Girish Chandra Murmu for the restructuring of Tourism Development Authorities (TDAs) is yet to take effect despite the fact that this move would have ensured their smooth functioning.
The former Lieutenant Governor passed the order after chairing a meeting to review the functioning of the Planning, Development and Monitoring Department at Civil Secretariat here on 10th December 2019. He had asked for speedy restructuring of the Tourism Development Authorities, saying that there was a pressing need to revamp the tourism sector.
Subsequently, Chief Secretary BVR Subrahmanyam, convened several meetings and directed the concerned Administrative Secretary to begin the restructuring process promptly, but no progress has been made despite the passing of over a year. “The Tourism Department is deliberately delaying the process for some unknown reasons,” an official privy to details said.
After the bifurcation of the Jammu and Kashmir into two Union Territories, the numbers of development authorities were reduced to improve their functioning. “Even though the number was reduced from 24 to 21, some of them are non-functional and exist on papers only,” another official said, adding the insufficient manpower has made these development authorities redundant.
In absence of adequate human resources, most of these development authorities are headless. “The posts of the Chief Executive Officers are vacant and authorities have asked a junior officer to do the job which affects its functions. This defeats the very aim of forming these development authorities”, an official said, adding that most of the Development Authorities were formed because of political reasons.
Several Tourism Development Authorities including Tosa Maidan, Shopian-Dubjan-Peer-Ki-Gali and Bani-Basohli that were formed during PDP-BJP Coalition Government in 2017 have failed to impact the tourism of respective areas. “They were formed in haste, with no serious thinking. So the Government failed to develop the infrastructure for tourists,” an official said, adding the Development Authorities didn’t improve the tourist footfalls in these areas, which makes it imperative for them to develop an extensive Master Plan for them.
Administrative Secretary Tourism, Sarmad Hafeez, said that he will get back on the issue within two-three days.
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