Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Sept 19: J&K is progressively heading towards peace, political stability and development with a renewed vigour and determination.
This was stated by Provincial President, National Conference Devender Singh Rana while interacting with Johanne Forest, Head of Political and Economic Affairs, Canadian High Commission in New Delhi, Senior Ottawa based South Asia Analyst Jawad Qureshi and Senior Analyst Political and Economic Affairs at Canadian High Commission New Delhi, Madhursi Das.
He dwelt upon measures taken for the faster development of the State, combating unemployment by taking innovative measures, implementing various welfare programmes, ensuring transparency and accountability in the administration by introducing Right to Information and Public Services Guarantee Acts etcetera.
Rana also referred to the successful conduct of Panchayat elections and restoration of Panchayati Raj Institutions and also referred to the special constitutional position of J&K.
Meanwhile, the high level Canadian High Commission delegation called on Dr Jitendra Singh, a renowned intellectual, scholar and columnist and discussed wide range of diverse subjects of national and regional importance.
Dr Singh said the youth of Valley need to be educated that they have been taken for a ride in the name of romantic slogans, which has ended up depriving them of the unlimited advantages of globalization and also of the enormous mainstream benefits available to the youth in the rest of the Sub-continent. But for militancy and the unwarranted constitutional restrictions, the city of Srinagar would have developed today like another Hyderabad or Bangaluru, he added.
Dr Singh said, what is most worrisome is that these riots, for the first time, tended to institutionalize tacit “State sponsorship” of communal violence as the administration chose to remain indifferent for hours at a stretch when selective looting and destruction of establishments belonging to a particular community was going on.
Canadian delegation also interacted with the office bearers of Chamber of Commerce and Industry (CCI).
YV Sharma, President, CCI along with his team of office bearers discussed various issues of mutual interest to both Canada and J&K.
While interacting with delegation it was impressed that Jammu has very good potential of exporting agriculture produce like Basmati Rice and we are sure that their visit will prove very beneficial in strengthening the mutual business relation and cooperation between J&K and Canada.
The visiting delegation expressed that if anybody from J&K is desirous of exporting some local items to Canada or importing some items from Canada they can approach the High Commission of Canada in New Delhi for further help and guidance.
Among others present were Sham Lal Langer, senior vice president, CCI, Arun Gupta, secretary general, Deepak Agga-rwal, secretary and Bharat Bhushan Gupta, treasurer.
Canadian High Commission team also visited University of Jammu and interacted with faculty and students. They met Vice Chancellor of the University Prof Mohan Paul Singh Ishar, who while speaking apprised the team about various programmes offered by the University as well as the initiatives undertaken to make education more meaningful and pertinent. VC also informed them about various campuses that were being set up by the university to broaden the base of higher education in the State. Vinay Thusoo, Public Relations Officer was also present in the meeting.
The team also visited the Faculty of Social Sciences and Department of Economics which hosted the Canadian delegation in the Department of Economics, University of Jammu. Ms Forest threw light on the opportunities that Canada had to offer to Indian students, scholars and researchers, especially in the education sector.
Among others, who took part in the discussion were Prof Jasbir Singh, Dr Prakash Antahal, Dr Aroon Sharma, Dr Sunita Sharma, Dr Virender Kaundal, Dr Manoj Bhatt, Dr Shallu Sehgal, etc.
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