EARLY TIMES REPORT
JAMMU, Mar 27: Lambasting the J&K govt for disconnecting the power supplies to poor, indigent, BPL masses for failure to pay their nominal bills, Harsh Dev Singh former Minister today questioned the non-initiation of action against ex-Ministers/MLAs owing millions of rupees to the power Deptt as dues of power consumed by them during the last several years. He said that the RTI reply received by him had revealed that majority of ex-Ministers and MLAs who continued to occupy Estates mansions and ministerial bungalows had neither paid the rent for use of govt accommodation and nor had they paid the bills for power consumed by them which ran in several lacs in individual cases.
Harsh Dev Singh divulged that the RTI reply stated that VIP Kothi No 7 was occupied by an MLA (name not disclosed in RTI) who owed Rs 38,62,852 (thirty eight lacs sixty two thousand eight hundred and fifty two) to the govt as power dues as on 1st October, 2021. Likewise, it stated that Chander Parkash Ganga owed Rs 2,74,565. The power dues of various other ex-Ministers/MLAs for the Estates as on 1st October, 2021 G.H Lone Rs 306,544; were Bungalow No 3 Wazarat Road occupied by MOS (name not mentioned in RTI reply)-Rs. 481368; Zulfikar Ali Minister Rs. 26,51,967; Advisor K.K Sharma Kothi No.3-Rs. 4,81,368; VIP Kothi No.8 MLA (name not given)-Rs. 2,89,644; Kavinder Gupta 4-SPL, ex-Deputy CM-Rs. 21,91,223; Sunil Kumar 14-SPL, Minister-Rs. 8,38,182; Apni Party office Gandhi Nagar-Rs. 1,44,203; and so on and so forth.
Singh said that with huge power bills outstanding against these and other ex-Ministers/MLAs and top bureaucrats, the govt seemed to have been granted immunity from penal action for power theft in view of power and influence wielded by them. And contrarily the poor and non-influential were being targeted and punished despite their nominal outstanding, deplored Harsh.
Further describing the repeated statements of J&K BJP President of free power and water supply and waving off the previous bills as ridiculous, Singh said that while the powerful and influential and those owing allegiance to BJP seemed to have been already exempted from payment of such bills, it was only the marginalized sections that were being harassed and persecuted in saffron rule. |
