* Accuses bureaucracy of conspiring to fail PRIs
Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Oct 18: All Jammu and Kashmir Panchayat Conference (AJKPC) has alleged that the bureaucracy in Jammu and Kashmir was creating hurdles to fail the Panchayati Raj Institutions for their vested interests.
While addressing a press conference at district headquarters Reasi after a meeting of office bearers of AJKPC, Anil Sharma, president of the organization alleged that senior officers in J&K do not pay any attention to the repeated calls and prayers of the PRI members and make every attempt to discredit the elected representatives.
Sharma informed the media persons that the Panches, Sarpanches and BDCs have apprised him about the casual approach adopted by the officers of the Rural Development and other allied departments, be it Revenue, PHE (Jal Shakti), PWD, PDD or any other department, the officers are reluctant in processing files and prioritizing the works approved by the Gram Sabhas.
He said instead of taking up construction and other developmental works that are approved by the Gram Sabhas in phased manner, the officers of the Rural Development Department use their own method in selecting the works for executions.
He said even the contractors to whom the works are allotted under the patronage of the officers do not pay any heed to the concerns of the villagers or of elected representatives instead these contractors simply reply that the tenders have been approved by the technical team via e-tendering process hence they are not accountable to the elected representatives and undermine the authority of Panchayat and Gram Sabha.
Often the contractors do not start the approved work for months together and in other cases officers do not issue work approval letter to successful bidders which ultimately cause delay in execution of works, he lamented.
AJKPC president further said that despite liberal funding by the Government of India, the results are not the ground level just due to the dictatorial approach of the officers who are hell bent to defame the Prime Minister, Union Home Minister and Lieutenant Governor.
He threatened to launch a full fledged agitation if the bureaucracy do not give the due respect to the elected PRI representatives as defined under law.
Other prominent people who were present and spoke in the press conference included, Sarpanches- Raj Kumar Sharma, Kewal Singh, Baldev Raj Sharma, Raj Kumar, Ravi Kumar,
Parshotam Singh, Kartar Nath, Kabla Singh, Gandhrav Singh, Vaneet Panjgotra, Mohd Latif, Mohan Lal and Abdul Hamid.
Trending Now
E-Paper
Follow our WhatsApp channel