I n the instant case , that of concerning the affairs regarding the revered Hindu shrines of great importance from many angles, the indifference and apathy exhibited by the UT Government, we are afraid, is a question of apeculiar mindset. After the world famous Shrine of Mata ShriVaishnoDevi inKatra , Shri Shiv Khori Shrine in Reasi district and Shri Mata Sukrala Devi and Shri Mata BalaSundri Shrines in Kathua district hold a particular level of reverence among the devotees and hence carry the requisite importance of management and maintenance too. There can be no qualms in respect of the management, administration and governance of these shrines to be in impeccable manner, transparent manner and in such a way that there were adequate facilities and comforts for the visiting devotees . Had some measure of funds problem from the Government treasury accruable to these shrines been there, we could have given some leverage and ‘benefit’ to the Government regarding host of reasons, if not excuses, put forth leading to no decision or inaction on its part. The issue,on the contrary, is keeping in utter dormancy, the requisite respective Boards of these shrines. The problem is of absence of administrative initiative and action. It is incumbent upon the Government to see and ensure that following completion of the requisite tenure of members on the Boards of these shrines , fresh induction took place so as to lend credence to the concept of continuity which is at the core of any such Board to function. That would make the said Boards legally and otherwise fully functional to manage and administer the things about these shrines. The ground realities are that many non-official members having completed their tenure several years back, the Government t appears to be in deep slumber in respect of not making fresh nominations. So far as nominations and the eligibility governing induction of non- official members are concerned the same having clearly been mentioned in the relevant rules , there should have been no problem on the part of the Government on that count but perhaps, no one seems to be concerned or bothered. Again , looking to what the relevant sections of the two Acts , viz Jammu and Kashmir Shri Shiv Khori Shrine Act 2008 and Shri Mata Sukrala Devi and Shri Mata BalaSundri Shrine Act of 2013 clearly mention that the Boards could not transact any business unless at least seven members were present and no fresh nominations against the vacant non-official members simply mean rendering the two Boards non-functional and impeding the normal process of administering and managing these historic reverential shrines of Hindus. Here, we may also refer to the amendments in these two Acts carried out by the Union Ministry of Home Affairs to smoothen and pave the way for nominating of even non- J&K residents as non-official members on these two Boards only to broad base and widen the scope of nominations and not necessarily restrict to non resident nominations , still the Government has taken no decision. Since the powers of how the funds were managed and spent in respect of these shrines vested with the Boards, no financial decisions could be taken which again went against the interests of these shrines. Now, let us for theoretical purposes, analyse as to how many times even the official members have convened meetings of the concerned two Boards, the data available suggest for quite a long time no such meetings have taken place. These Government officials mainly Divisional Commissioner, Deputy Commissioners, Director Tourism etc are so much engrossed in their official duties that perhaps they think convening meetings of the Boards did not fall in the list of their official duties. Even otherwise, any deliberations or discussions outside the realms of the Acts governing these Boards carry no importance. We , therefore, urge the UT Government to take an urgent call in the matter and make these two Boards fully functional so that the normal activities right from worshipping to developing and maintaining these shrines to providing basic facilities to visiting pilgrims get regularised and streamlined
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