Sanjeev Pargal
JAMMU, Feb 25: Facing heat from the people of Jammu region for failure to come up to their expectations on a host of pro-Jammu issues, high-level BJP-RSS meeting tonight decided that a Group of Ministers from the BJP would meet Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti shortly to resolve the issues as an opinion emerged within the two organizations that if the party was unable to fulfill the aspirations of Jammu people, which they had championed for decades, they shouldn’t hesitate from coming out of the Government.
All 11 BJP Ministers, eight Cabinet and three MoS, top brass of RSS including all powerful Romesh Puppa and BJP including two Members of Parliament (MPs), State president Sat Sharma ‘CA’ and three general secretaries, met at the residence of Deputy Chief Minister Dr Nirmal Singh for “brain storming session” lasting about five hours this evening as pressure mounted on the party from all quarters following gherao of party Ministers and MLAs at Sunderbani, Nowshera and Jammu City on the issue of Kathua Engineering College, Additional DC posts for Nowshera, Sunderbani and Kalakote, withdrawal of FIRs against 2008 Shri Amarnath Ji land row agitation, discrimination in recruitment with Jammu by Public Services Commission and Services Selection Board and a host of other issues.
Insiders told the Excelsior the high-level meeting decided that a Group of Ministers will meet Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti apprising her of the expectations the people of Jammu have with the BJP for years together and that these hopes had gone up after the party came to power with the PDP.
“The BJP would like all its issues to be settled,” insiders told the Excelsior.
According to sources, there was a strong view from senior RSS and BJP leaders that a message shouldn’t go to the people of Jammu region that the BJP wants to stick to power at the cost of Jammu’s interests.
“If the BJP, despite being in power is unable to fulfill aspirations of the people of Jammu, it shouldn’t hesitate from coming out of the power,” they said.
Top RSS leaders, who attended the meeting with all 11 BJP Ministers, Members of Parliament and senior office bearers, were reported to have taken the BJP Ministers to task over “latest happenings” including University Institute of Engineering and Technology, Kathua, posts of Additional Deputy Commissioners in Nowshera, Sunderbani and Kalakote, withdrawal of 2008 Shri Amarnath Ji land row agitation FIRs even after hundreds of such FIRs were withdrawn against stone pelters of Kashmir and “unabated discrimination” with Jammu region as a whole in all recruitments by the PSC and SSB.
The BJP Ministers were categorically told that all the FIRs registered against Jammu youths during 2008 land agitation had to be withdrawn by the State Government as “failure to do so” was bringing bad name to the party.
The high-level meeting comes just days after people gheroed BJP Ministers Bali Bhagat and Abdul Ghani Kohli and senior leaders including party’s State president Sat Sharma `CA” at Sunderbani on the demand of Additional DC’s post while ABVP workers surrounded the official vehicle of Minister of state for Education Priya Sethi in the City over keeping affiliation of University Institute of Engineering and Technology, Kathua with Jammu University.
Insiders said there was a view among some of the RSS and BJP leaders that it was time for eight Cabinet Minister of the party to be assertive in the Cabinet and ensure that decisions are taken very carefully, which don’t hurt sentiments of any of the three regions especially Jammu and Ladakh, which were “core constituencies” of the BJP from where the party had won all three Lok Sabha seats and 25 MLA seats.
Sources said the issue of Additional DC’s post and Engineering College, Kathua figured prominently in the meeting and some of the RSS and BJP leaders wondered that how the post of Additional DC was sanctioned for Koteranka without approval of the Cabinet, which has led to agitation in Nowshera, Sunderbani and Kalakote with people “directly blaming” the BJP for “fiasco” and even gheroing the senior Ministers and leaders. The meeting noted that BJP represents both Nowshera-Sunderbani and Kalakote Assembly segments and it could lose the vote bank there if it was not able to get posts of Additional DCs sanctioned immediately.
“There was a view that the BJP’s Cabinet Ministers should ensure that agenda of the Cabinet meeting is circulated at least three days in advance so that the party Ministers sit together, discuss the agenda and decide what was in the interest of the State and through which no region will be discriminated,” sources said, adding the Ministers should see to it that how the post of Additional DC was approved for Koteranka without the Cabinet nod.
Similarly, there was a view that the BJP Ministers should be assertive enough to ensure that the issue of Kathua Engineering College was settled amicably taking into account the “wishes and aspirations” of the students and the people of Jammu, who want the College to stay with University of Jammu saying there can be no compromise on this issue.
“The issue of PDP strengthening itself in the Cabinet by gaining an additional berth in violation of agreed position and securing more posts of vice chairpersons of Corporations and Boards, was also taken up in the meeting and the BJP Ministers were asked to take it up with Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti as well as the Coordination Committee of the two coalition partners, PDP and BJP,” sources said.
The PDP had unilaterally increased its strength in the Cabinet to 12 including the Chief Minister in December as against the agreed position of 11, leaving BJP at eight Cabinet berths only. Similarly, PDP has made its three additional vice chairpersons of various Corporations/Board.
Sources said the RSS and BJP leaders admitted that there was need to assert in the Government and the Cabinet to ensure that no such decisions are taken, which create embarrassment for the party as has happened in the case of Additional DC’s post for Koteranka and Engineering College, Kathua for which the BJP Ministers and leaders were facing “all round condemnations” from the people of Jammu.
Sources said some of the party leaders were of the view that Jammu and Ladakh regions were not benefiting out of the Centrally Sponsored Schemes, as they should be at a time when there were BJP Governments at both Centre and State.
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