Jammu, June 11
With temperature hovering around 47°C here, frequent power cuts and dry drinking water taps have added to the woes of people. However, power minister Rigzin Zora blames electricity consumers for the abrupt overloading of the transmission system.

The Power Development Department (PDD) today announced a daily cut of two hours in areas so far being supplied power for 24 hours. The curtailment will be of six hours in other areas of the city and districts.

However, the PDD was not sticking to the curtailment schedule and people were crying because of frequent unscheduled breakdowns and low voltage. This has led to acute shortage of drinking water as the pumping stations of the Public Health Engineering (PHE) Department were unable to operate.

Zora said on telephone that there was no shortage of electricity, but the problem had been caused as consumers were indulging in overdrawing power. Curtailment was being resorted to in order to prevent damage to transformers.

He said the power projects of the state were running at low capacity as the discharge in rivers was not up to the mark because of cold temperature at higher reaches that was preventing the melting of snow.

The minister said leaving apart Himachal Pradesh, J&K was better than any other state in the region as far as electric supply was concerned.

Zora said it was not possible to overdraw power from the Northern Grid as the PDD had to pay Rs 7 for per unit of electricity under such arrangement.

Meanwhile, reports from the districts of Kathua, Samba, Rajouri, Poonch, Reasi, Doda and Ramban indicated acute power crisis in these areas. BJP chief Ashok Khajuria said when the state government did not hesitate to purchase power at an exorbitant rate of Rs 7 per unit during winters when there is shortage in the Kashmir valley, there was no justification to punish the people of Jammu by resorting to power cuts in the boiling temperature.

Udhampur, June 11
Militants shot dead two persons,a head constable of the Jammu and Kashmir Police and a brother of a surrendered militant, in the Gool area of Ramban district.

The deceased have been identified as head constable Khurshid Malik of Ramban police station and Mohammed Saleem Bhat,a surrendered militant.

Superintendent of police (SP) Ramban, Basant Rath told The Tribune that Malik had gone to his native village where he was killed by militants.

Reports reaching here said at 2 am today militants of the Hizbul Mujahideen outfit entered Moila village of Gool. They forced their entry into the house of the head constable and resorted to indiscriminate firing. Malik died on the spot, while his wife received severe injuries.

Deployed at Ramban police station, Malik had gone to Gool on official duty and went to spend night at his native village.

After killing Malik, the militants entered the house of Bhat and called him out and later shot him from pointblank range.

Reports added that militants escaped from the site after the killing.

The Army and local police have launched a combing operation to track down the militants responsible for the incident. 

Srinagar, June 11
Former Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed has welcomed the Prime Minister’s statement in Berlin and urged him to honour commitmentof troop cut made to people of this state. He said the latest declaration of the Prime Minister "the destinies of the people of India and Pakistan are interlinked and they must find the pathways to resolve issues and live together", would be meaningless without the earlier commitments.

The PDP patron addressing party MLAs and functionaries from south Kashmir here today reminded the Prime Minister of his November 2004 pledge troop cut and the subsequent affirmative assertions in and outside the round -table conferences. He said despite declarations, the J&K-specific reconciliation and confidence building process, however, seemed to be losing sheen raising serious doubts in the public of its credibility. "Such a disconcerting trend is disturbing and could have serious implications for the state and the nation," he cautioned. Mufti held the current peace process owed its strength to the former Prime Minister Atal Behari vajpayee’s who launched it from Kashmir in 2003.

Welcoming the Prime Minister’s remarks on Indo-Pakistan relations at Berlin, Sayeed said the paradigm of Indo-Pak friendship would, however, be incomplete without dignity and opportunity for people of J & K. "The peace process, for obvious reasons, would never make any progress as a stand-alone proposition between India and Pakistan bypassing Kashmir", he said. Mufti added the country’s leadership must, without giving in to the hawkish postures, pick up elements of sanity and consensus and strike new benchmark by addressing the genuine and just concerns of people of Jammu & Kashmir. This, he said would be the fundamental input for transforming the situation.

Reiterating his stand on troop cut and revocation of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) Mufti Sayeed said these were inevitable and any move to stall this process was fraught with dangers. "The people of Jammu and Kashmir have to be freed from violence to generate atmosphere for the success of the peace process", he said. He added instead of trying to freeze the problem of Kashmir in a time-frame, imaginative and progressive measures, in line with political, historical and cultural contours of the state, have to be initiated to give people hope for peace, progress and stability.

Udhampur, June 11
Surrender of two more militants in Doda this morning shows that the Army- police strategy to win back misguided youth is paying off. To persuade the misguided youth to shun the path of violence and join the mainstream, security forces involved religious leaders and of militants' parents to guide their wards.

``For the past three months we have been convening meetings with parents of militants and suggesting them to persuade their children to join mainstream'', said senior superintendent of police (SSP) Doda Manohar Singh. He said it was due to this policy many militants have laid down arms .

In Doda district,a majority of the locals are fed with violence and gun culture. They want to live in peace. Some militants through their parents expressed desire to live in peace. Parents established contact with the security forces and paved the way for the surrender of their wards.

Doda police has been organising police public- meetings especially in villages of the militants. At these meetings family members of the militants are usually called and assigned the job of persuading those who have taken the gun to `solve their problems'.

The SSP Doda claimed the policy had yielded very encouraging response. Surrenderof 10 militants before Chief Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad, last week, was a big blow to the Harkat- ul- Mujahideen outfit. Similarly during the past two months 24 militants have either laid down arms or arrested.

Sources in the Police Department said a majority of the local militants were willing to surrender but some of them hesitate to do so due to fear of foreign mercenaries. Instead of surrender before security forces some local militants preferred to be arrested by the police or the Army, a senior police officer quoting intercepts of some militants disclosed. ``Threats of militants always loom large in case of surrender. So many militants, through their messengers, have suggested to security forces to stage the drama of arrest to protect lives of their family members'', sources said and pointed out there were many cases when family members of surrender militants were attacked.

Religious leaders also come out to save lives of misguided youth. Under Operation Sadbhawana the Army has been conducting tour of religious leaders to expose them to realities. After returning from tour across the country, these religious leaders are guiding the misguided youth.

Meanwhile two militants — Shahbaz alias Gazi son of Mohammed Hanief of Gandoh and another commander of Hizbul Mujahideen Riyaz Ahmed today laid down arms before the Army and the police.