Mir Farhat
Sopore constituency in North Kashmir which is represented by ruling National Conference legislator Mohammad Ashraf Ganaie has nothing to show on the development except the mounting complaints and anger against their MLA for ignoring and neglecting them in his tenure.
Ganaie defeated Abdul Rashid Dar of Congress by a margin of 1000 votes in 2008 elections. Ganaie polled 4368 votes and Dar 3304.
Inhabitants in Valley’s apple town says that they have “never seen their MLA” to hear grievances or ever bothered to meet the public, trade or civil society bodies to build the area with his support.
A visit to any village to see how life has changed on developmental front reveals a dismal role of the legislator. Conversation with residents of the area reveals the sorry State of this constituency.
Residents of Seelu, Botingoo, Seer, Arampora, Zainageer belt and other dozens of villages said they have not seen their legislator nor have they seen anything changing in the area in the last over five years.
Inhabitants said the state of healthcare and its related infrastructure has gone from bad to worse. The Maternity and Childcare Hospital in Sopore is craving for improvement in basic facilities to patients – pregnant women and infants.
Patients and their attendants said the hospital is plagued with problems – primarily a shortage of doctors and staff nurses. It also does not have an emergency care ward or even a full-fledged maternity care unit, and space to accommodate a heavy rush of patients.
The 10-bed hospital sees a huge rush of patients from Sopore, Bandipora and Kupwara areas. At least, 100 pregnant women visit the hospital everyday but due to dearth of doctors, the patients get least care in the hospital.
Hospital officials said it has only three gynecologists, 4 Assistant surgeons to attend to the huge rush of patients, which were “not enough” to cater to a huge number.
The hospital was run by DP Memorial Dhar Trust and was taken over by Government on July 13, 1998, and shifted to the old hospital building in March 2008 when the sub-district hospital was constructed. However, the facilities at the hospital were not improved by the Government, only its location was changed.
On average 90 babies are delivered in the hospital every month. The hospital has bed capacity of 10 beds, but 12 more beds have been added to manage the patients.
“The hospital adjusts critical patients in a small space which can be fatal. There is no proper heating arrangement; kerosene and gas heaters are being used which risk the health of women and their infants,” said an attendant, Irshad Ahmad.
Locals said the Government has not completely adopted the hospital.
“It should be immediately shifted to a new block constructed in the sub district hospital. Its surroundings are dirty. The washrooms located inside the hospital premises have been left unwashed from several months and now dogs are roaming inside,” the locals said.
Block Medical Officer, Dr. Syed Masood, had promised and told the residents that the maternity hospital would get funds from National Rural Health Mission to improve its healthcare delivery mechanism.
The residents said he had told them last year in November it would be shifted to new block of the Sub-district Hospital within 15 days, but “that was lie”.
Health facilities like primary health centers, sub centers and dispensaries in other villages and localities reflect the dismal state having staff dearth and lacking basic facilities.
The sanitation and cleanliness has not seen any improvement in the town as mounds of garbage are seen littered across Sopore town with the Sopore Municipal Council (SMC) officials failing in dumping the waste generated in the town.
Officials say the dispute over a dumping site has aggravated the problem.
Residents said they have been living with stink and fear of diseases for the past several months since the civic body started collecting garbage near throughout the town.
“The civic body has failed to dump the solid waste generated in the town. Our town with respect to cleanliness is at its lowest ebb, dirtiest in the Valley as municipal council’s role is dismal,” said Haji Mohammad Ahsraf Ganaie, President Traders Federation Sopore.
The municipal council is piling up garbage alongside roads, in the vicinity of schools, hospitals and Government offices.
“Instead of dumping the waste in a duping site, the council is heaping it near Maternity and Child Hospital, Government higher schools and other offices. It is proving dangerous for the health of the public. These heaps of garbage spread stink in the town, making it difficult to walk without covering the nose,” Ganaie said, who was flanked by other traders.
The traders said they have time and again requested the administration to address their long-pending issues, but to no avail.
The council officials say they had allotted a dumping site in Tulibal area which was stayed by court after Sangrama legislator objected to the dumping.
After the dispute, another dumping site was approved in Adipora area for which funds were also allotted. But, its construction too was hindered due to tussle between former Congress legislator, Abdul Rashid Dar and current NC legislator Mohammad Ashraf Ganaie.
With eye on vote bank, the legislators don’t not want dumping site should be constructed in their areas as they fear residents might blame them for it.
The trade body leader said that even the then divisional commissioner had two months before during a meeting told them that all the garbage would be dumped at Tulbal dumping site. However, it has not been done.
“The official inefficiency and the politics played by legislators over the dumping of the waste have landed common people into trouble as garbage has created havoc. We have been dying with bullets from the last 20 years, but now we will die because of garbage and its stink,” said Ganaie.
The role of municipality in the town is a total failure, they said. “Municipality has an Army of employees, and the funds they collect are spent on their salaries. Nothing is spent on development of the town. They have completely failed,” Ganaie said.
Being the commercial hub of North Kashmir, Sopore sees an overwhelming traffic and shoppers daily. But the administration and their legislator has done nothing to address the problems of traffic jam and vehicle parking issues of the people.
The town has 40-year-old bus yard which the municipality has failed to macadamize form last 30 years. It has not been maintained and cleaned by the concerned agency.
On improving the state of education, nothing has changed. Students and teachers of Girls Higher Secondary School of Sopore have been facing untold hardships as their institution grapples with space and basic facilities.
Located in the busy market in the town, the school management finds it difficult to accommodate about 1800 female students in the two storey building, which has few lecture halls.
Abdul Ahad Charoo, a senior teacher of the school said they were facing immense hardships to teach the students in congested classrooms.
“Nearly 1800 students are enrolled with almost all major streams being taught. But, we fear for the careers of these students as only 30 teachers including lectures are teaching them. The school has a huge staff dearth in addition to space. Only five rooms are available for teaching,” Charoo said.
Surprisingly, the school has only one English Lecturer while 18 lectures are required to be delivered everyday for different streams. The school management uses the services of Master Grade teachers to “facilitate” the English class-work. The school has a single laboratory for carrying out experiments and practical lessons in science subjects.
“We face difficulties in concentrating on lectures because our classrooms are congested as if we are in a crowd,” the students said. The students also complained about the lack of washrooms due to which they face huge “embarrassing” situation during a nature’s call. And they also don’t have a playground to play during their games or leisure time.
Not only this, the school’s problems have been aggravated by its location. More than 100 vendors have encroached upon the path running alongside the school wall that separates it from its small premises. The road remains jammed by traffic rush as vendors have encroached upon it, and the honking form these vehicles adds to the noise.
“Vendors have created noise pollution around the school, students can hardly pick up what teachers teach them in the classes. We have time and again informed the district administration for removing these encroachments by vendors, but nothing has happened as yet,” said Charoo.
The Sopore Municipality has also deteriorated the school environment by piling up garbage dumps alongside its wall just near the entry gate.
The teachers said the school’s enrollment was further burdened after students from a high school were shifted there when their school collapsed in 2010.
The school management and the local residents said they have suggested to the Government to shift the school to the DIET building as that has enough space to accommodate the heavy roll of students.
The only Degree College built some 40 years ago, has same accommodation which it had then, despite increasing roll of students manifold.
The residents said no new school has been constructed in the constituency in the last five years.
The town has got no drainage system. Street lights are totally defunct, the residents said.
Residents of Sopore town are struggling with dilapidated roads as the Government has failed to repair them despite their repeated appeals to the officials concerned.
The roads leading to villages of Sopore and other colonies within the town are marked with numerous pot-holes and have not been macadamised.
Residents said their town was plagued with hundreds of un-attended developmental issues, with the district administration completely failing to address any one of them.
“The roads in the town, be that the main road or the link roads which connect the town with the inner residential colonies, are dilapidated, and pot-holes have plagued them. The bumpy rides due to bad roads have hampered our business besides annoying commuters,” said Naseer Ahmad.
Several new residential colonies came up in the town in the last 30 years as population has been increasing, and along with them have been constructed same number of link roads.
Residents said the Government has not macadamised any of these roads.
Residential colonies roads like in Hanfia Colony, Crankhshen Colony, Maharajpora, Sofi Akbar road, road from Court to Iqbal nagar and Crankhshen Colony, and road along Yasin Shah Market which connects Sopore with Dangerpora at Police Station are full of pot-holes which have left hundreds of residents irked.
“None of the residential colonies has a concrete road. The residents have to take bumpy rides which consume their time to reach their work places and back. The administration seems to be least concerned about it,” Ahmad said.
The road network in the area has not improved. Roads interlinking villages and linking them with town are in dilapidated condition.
Two villages skirting the shore of Wullar Lake in Sopore outskirts has threatened migration if the Government doesn’t repair the road before the onset of harsh winter.
The villagers said the Government has failed to repair the 3.5 kilometer road that skirts the banks of Wullar Lake in Sopore.
The road stretch from Watlab to Zoorimaz and Bangladesh, the two hamlets on the lake shore, has numerous potholes and huge ditches. Even drivers refuse to ply their vehicles on the road despite villagers offering them double fare.
Beeba, 50, said she had never seen any repair work done on the road from the day when she had been married in Bangladesh village. “I was a young girl when I was married. Lot of things changed here, but one thing that has remained same is this dilapidated road,” she said, who was chaperoning her daughter home after returning from Maternity and Child Care Hospital in Sopore for a check-up of her two-month old baby. She said she has never seen any official coming to visit the road to relieve the villagers from the agony they face while walking on the road.
“We feel like a doomsday is looming over us when we have to leave our village for to market or to a hospital. We want to migrate from this village, but where shall we go,” she laments.
Her daughter, who did not want to be named, said falling ill or bearing children in the village was a sin as the women fear leaving their homes for visiting a doctor.
“The miserable road has made our lives hell. The Government has left us nowhere. How could an expecting mother walk on this road on which healthy men fear to tread,” she said, while her cousin carries her infant baby along with her.
A bridge over river Jehlum is being constructed to connect Sopore with other north Kashmir region from the last 23 years. The bridge will ease traffic pressure in Sopore town and will enhance trade in the region. But due to the slow pace of work and ht incomplete bridge, the area is suffering a lot.
Twenty three years after the construction on Sopore Bypass Bridge was initiated, the 226-meter-long bridge has missed many deadlines. The latest deadline has also been missed by the authority in which it was asked to complete the bridge by end of May 2014.
The construction work on the vital link was supposed to be completed within four years and bridge was to be thrown open in 2008. However, the work on bridge is still going on.
The bridge will connect Kupwara, Sopore and Baramulla areas and outskirts of Sopore town. The completion of bridge will also help ease frequent traffic jams in Sopore town.
In addition to these un-addressed problems, the fruit mandi in Sopore where all the apple growers trade their cash-crop lies in shambles. It has no proper and macadamize road, neither has it any facility like communication, banking or office for traders.
Inhabitants said the drinking water which they are been supplied by PHE is unhygienic and impure to use.
The MLA Sopore, Mohammad Ashraf Ganaie, was contacted several times by this reporter during this week but he didn’t come out with any response to the quires.
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