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| The ongoing assembly session and Jammu | | It's All Kashmir | | Neha
Jammu, Oct 1: The 9-day-long session of the Jammu and Kashmir legislature started on September 26. Five days are over and four days are left. No business was transacted on the first day. Only obituaries and nothing else. The next two days witnessed an ugly drama enacted by the MLAs, mostly belonging to the Congress. The Congress ministers and MLAs, without any exception, indulged in unruly activities with a view to making the assembly dysfunctional and they were successful. The entire nation witnessed the ugly drama, with the Congress MLAs creating disturbances in the House on an unprecedented scale and shouting slogans against the BJP. No business was transacted. The next two days also witnessed the NC and the PDP legislators clashing with each other and raking up issues, which were emotive and divisive and had nothing to do with the happiness and well-being of the people. Issues of governance became a casualty.
The fact is that all the five days were consumed by issues ranging from clemency for Afzal Guru to expulsion and disqualification of 7 BJP MLAs who had cross voted in April this year to alleged human rights violations in Kashmir to the alleged custodial deaths, including the death of a prominent NC activist and fund-raiser Syed Mohammd Yousuf, to Public Safety Act and to what not. Charges and countercharges leveled by the NC and the PDP also dotted the assembly's scene during all these five days with the latter demanding resignation of the Chief Minister and Minister of State for Home Affairs. The NC and the PDP MLAs were not the only ones who raked up emotive and divisive issues. Other Kashmir-based MLAs, including the lone CPI-MLA, also did not lag behind. The focus was on Kashmir and Kashmir-related issues.
The proceedings in the last five days in the assembly have once again established that Jammu and Ladakh have no say in the state legislature. The Congress MLAs hailing from Jammu and Ladakh also failed to discharge their obligations towards their constituencies in these two unfortunate regions. They only obliged the NC in order to make the House dysfunctional. The BJP, the JKNPP and the JSM MLAs did make some feeble noises but no one in the ruling coalition and the PDP took any cognizance of what they said. They were odd faces in an assembly dominated by the NC, the PDP, the Congress and other Kashmiri law-makers, all interested in Kashmir and non-issues as far as the general people were concerned.
Jammu is inadequately represented in the assembly. But no law-maker thought it prudent to take up this issue to force the authorities to undertake measures to delimit the constituencies de novo so that the age-old demand of the people of Jammu province is met. Jammu is inadequately represented in vital service sector as well as the civil secretariat. But no law-maker thought it desirable to attract the attention of the authorities towards this glaring anomaly and acute unemployment problem in Jammu. Road connectivity in Jammu province is poor but no law-maker thought it proper to ask the authorities to bring the Jammu province at par with Kashmir as far as road connectivity is concerned. The historical places in Jammu, including Mubarak Mandi, the seat of power of the Dogras, are decaying but no law-maker, not even those belonging to Jammu province, thought it desirable to force the authorities to set apart the required money for the protection and preservation of these places of historical importance, symbols of Dogra civilization. The Tawi River, also called Sura Putri, is decaying and decaying very fast, but no law maker-thought it proper to persuade the authorities to earmark the needed money to preserve, conserve and beautify it on the pattern of River Jhelum. Mansar Lake, Surinsar Lake and Sanasar Lake are decaying and decaying very fast but no law-maker thought it desirable to take on the authorities saying that while they have spent hundreds and hundreds of crores of rupees for the preservation, conservation and beautification of Dal Lake and Whullar Lake, they have allowed the ancient lakes, located in Jammu province to decay. The power supply in Jammu is erratic and there scheduled and unscheduled cuts, but no law maker thought it desirable to ask how is it that there is uninterrupted power supply in Kashmir province gets electric supply round-the-clock and how is it that Jammu is virtually without power.
There are several other issues concerning Jammu province which, like the above-referred to issues, deserve immediate attention and favourable consideration but there is none in the assembly who is prepared to hit the nail on the head and say that the Jammu and Kashmir legislature has forgotten Jammu and Ladakh and that the Jammu and Kashmir legislature is nothing but an institution of Kashmir, for Kashmir and by Kashmir.
The situation is not going to transform in the foreseeable future because the Kashmiri law-makers are guided solely by the Kashmir interests and certain other interests - all questionable. But the people of Jammu province could not be allowed to suffer on account of the type of politics the Kashmiri law-makers have been indulging since decades. Their aspirations are different. Their attitudes are different. Their needs and problems are different. Hence, what is immediately needed is segregation of Jammu province from Kashmir so that the people of this province get their own assembly; so that the Jammu-related issues are discussed in the Jammu assembly. Jammu has already suffered much; it cannot suffer more losses any longer. |
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