Suhail Bhat
Srinagar, May 7 : The Industrial Estate in the Chotipora area of north Kashmir’s Handwara district lacks basic facilities, which is leading to disheartenment among the entrepreneurs who are running nearly 70 manufacturing units in the Estate.
The entrepreneurs are dismayed by the fact that the Government is discouraging them by not providing the necessary facilities, while also urging the youth to not run for jobs and become job seekers. They lamented that due to continuous rainfall over the last few days in Kashmir, severe waterlogging has occurred in the Estate, causing significant losses to the unit holders.
“Despite the issue of defunct drainage systems being brought to the attention of the officials, no action has been taken to resolve it,” the president of the Industrial Estate, Farooq Ahmad Shah, told the Excelsior. He added that despite spending nearly Rs 2 crore on constructing various facilities in the estate, they have yet to yield any significant results. “Although approximately 50 lakhs were spent on installing floodlights here, they are currently not functioning,” he said.
He said that even though the Government has provided enough funds for the facilities, they are still missing. “An Overhead Water Tank (OHT) has been constructed at a cost of 20 lakh rupees, but the taps are dry,” he said.
The entrepreneurs said that the non-serious attitude of the officials in implementing the official directives has disappointed them. They said DC Kupwara visited the Estate some days ago and instructed all departments to look into this matter, and although the unit holders are thankful to him, they feel that the departments have failed to redress their problems. “We are facing acute portable water supply and electricity problems and have suffered losses worth lakhs of rupees due to the damages caused by waterlogging,” another unit holder said.
The unit holders requested LG Manoj Sinha to look into the matter and resolve it as soon as possible. “If the matter is not resolved soon, we might be forced to adopt other means to be heard,” a unit holder said.
Tehsildar Handwara, Shahbaz Ahmad Akhoon, said that the administration has discussed these issues in several meetings held over the past few months. He assured that all the problems confronting the Industrial Estate would be resolved in the current fiscal year.
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