Estates Department which provides residential facilities to important functionaries is looted by the very functionaries. This is a paradox and a regrettable one. The elected representatives of people are supposed to be the role model for ordinary people. They have to set an example of a disciplined and emulative public life. Imagine the fate of a society in which public men steal from public exchequer and strengthen their personal financial stability at the cost of the poor tax payer. The worst is that when they have demitted the office and are replaced by newly elected representatives they become ordinary citizens. They have no right to claim for such facilities which the civil society gives them as a matter of privilege for the service they are rendering to society.
It is regrettable that our elected political leader are under the false impression that they can be the leaders for all the times in their lives and hence feel at liberty to perpetrate general loot of public exchequer. The first and foremost duty of an elected law maker whether in or out of office is to show due respect to the law of the land and on that basis ensure that others also obey the law. Election does not at all make them entitled to hoodwink a government agency for personal aggrandizement.
An application has been filed with the Estates Department by private individual seeking information about continued illegal occupation of Government accommodation by some privileged that have relinquished office and are now just ordinary citizens of the State. Estates Department, while responding has disclosed a list of former MLAs, MLCs and MPs who are defaulters according to the existing rules of allotment of government bungalows and flats and further in violation of the framework approved by the State Administrative Council headed by Governor N N Vohra early last year. Twenty five former Legislators and three former Members of Parliament figure in the list of defaulters by name. The Deputy Director Estates Jammu-cum-Public Information Officer, Satish Kumar Sharma has officially disclosed that total amount of 23 lakh rupees is outstanding against the named persons who include 19 former MLAs, 6 former MLCs and 3 former Members of Parliament. They have defaulted in payment of timely rent for the Government accommodation provided to them by the Estates Department in different prestigious locations of Jammu like Gandhi Nagar, Wazarat Road, Rehari, Talab Tillo, Ahata Amar Singh and Company Bagh. What remains a mystery is that after clear instructions of the SAC under Governor’s rule in March 2016, the maximum period for which an MLA/MLC/MP could retain Government accommodation after he or she had relinquished office is one month. But not months but years have passed, no action has been taken by the Government and illegal occupation by non-functional representatives continues. It is not difficult to understand why the Government is not evicting them and why they are neither clearing the arrears nor vacating the Government accommodation. It is nothing but vote-bank politics and the political influence these people wield with the administrative authorities and political heavyweights. Only corrupt and untrustworthy Government indulges in this type of crude and shameless politicking. This has been the ill -luck of the people of the State and one is reminded of the sadist axiom that by and large people get the government they deserve. Maximum of privileges in our polity are grabbed by the Ministers, bureaucrats and legislators. They leave crumbs for the plebeians just because plebeians do not count in their political chemistry. They think they have the divine right to loot the tax payer, and the so-called popular Government not only endorses but provides space for wanton loot.
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