More than two-year long exercise of including more contiguous areas in the existing limits of Jammu Municipal Corporation appears to be inching to successful completion. Urbanization is a natural corollary to economic development as new townships are coming up and old towns and cities are expanding at considerable speed. It is not true only about Jammu or Srinagar cities; it has been happening throughout the country. Naturally expansion of towns and cities demands that civic amenities and other facilities need to be provided to people who are physically closer to the old cities and have developed brisk interaction with the civic society in terms of trade, commerce, socialization, culture and administration. This is a vibrant sign of economic and social development and our country and the state are going through it.
Obviously with a Municipal Corporation, Jammu will go on developing and in due course of time will become eligible for A Class city status. But at the same time the increased population, owing to migration from rural to urban areas, has led to emergence of new habitats and localities in the peripheries of the city. Sadly, the state administration has not been sensitive to the requirement of planned township primarily owing to paucity of funds and secondarily to the negligence of concerned authorities. Now that deficiency cannot be covered and we have to remain content with haphazard way of raising new habitats in the peripheries of the town. Nevertheless, some basic necessities of life like water, electricity, sanitation, roads, transport and other services have to be provided to the inhabitants who have taken up abode in extended areas.
In this background, the Housing and Urban Development Department looking after the JMC has been engaged in a serious exercise of identifying the areas that need to be included in the jurisdiction of Jammu Municipal Corporation. This has been a procrastinated exercise in which many departments are involved, revenue, law, environment etc. The actual initiative has come from the Deputy Commissioner of Jammu because the matter falls within his jurisdiction. Thus with the cooperation of all concerned agencies the Deputy Commissioner identified the areas proposed to be included, and notified the same for the opinion and reaction of the general public. Many objections and fresh suggestions were received and the Deputy Commissioner met with numerous delegations to sort out their complaints or demands. He even called a meeting of all political parties to begin a discourse on the subject and take them on board. Obviously this exercise took a long time and objections were resolved one by one and new suggestions were incorporated in the scheme. On the basis of this ground work, the Deputy Commissioner prepared the final draft which identified 35 new areas to be included in the present jurisdiction of the Jammu Municipal Corporation. The case is now with the Law Department awaiting clearance and then the Housing and Urban Development Department will submit it to the Cabinet for final sanction. It is presumed that the last stage will be covered shortly and hopefully by the end of the year, final orders will be issued.
This is an achievement for Jammu Municipal Corporation. Its jurisdiction will widen and its revenues will increase. But with that its responsibilities will also multiply. It will have to give an account of its performance in providing civic amenities to the extended areas. Frankly speaking, though the JMC has improved its functioning in many ways yet more remains to be done. Although the JMC has no direct control on some essential services like power and water supply, yet whatever be the case it has a role in equitable and regular distribution of such services and that role should be performed. In particular, in the sanitation area, JMC will have to gear up with efficiency. It has to streamline supervision and control over edibles like vegetables, milk and milk products, meat and fish. It has to ensure that eateries in the city meet the required standard of sanitation and food preservation. It has to have modern garbage disposal plants not only provided but also functional so that the city remains clean and its ecology remains healthy. JMC has to be in close consultations with the city traffic unit of the Traffic Department to improve city transport and expand connectivity. In short, the JMC has a wide ranging agenda at hand and with inclusion of 35 new areas into its jurisdiction, its workload will increase. It must, therefore, gear up to meet the challenge and deliver the goods. People of Jammu expect a lot from JMC. They will certainly cooperate once they find that the JMC is sensitive to its responsibilities.
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