Trungal (Ramban), February 15
Sufferings of over six lakh inhabitants of the cut-off Doda and Kishtwar districts are increasing with every passing day as the work to carve out an alternative track has been going on snail’s pace due to the topography of the area. The beacon authorities have already declared the sunken track as “irreparable” and there is a remote possibility of the early construction of diversion road through Ugana-Chamkala to connect Assar with Pul Doda.

“We have to climb maximum 7 km everyday to reach our destinations”, said Abdul Gani, a resident of Assar, who runs a tea stall at Thansal, on the Batote-Kishtwar National Highway. Pointing towards the track temporary carved out for the passengers, he said “covering a distance of 7 km per day on foot on this track was also risky as the road had become slippery”.

Echoing similar viewpoint, Abdul Qayoom Wani, a native of Koura Pani village who reached Assar to purchase vegetables for his family, said there was an acute scarcity of fruits, vegetables, medicines and LPG in the areas across the sunken track. “The authorities are only concentrating on the district headquarters while as suffering of the inhabitants of the remotest areas have been piling up with every passing day”, rued Ranjit Singh of Jatthi, who was on his way to Batote to purchase medicine for his ailing mother.

Hardship of the inhabitants can be gauged from the fact every day more than 5,000 people cross the track on foot to reach their destinations. Although the authorities have made arrangements for trans-shipment of the passengers, this arrangement is not solving problems of the people as supplying essential commodities like LPG, fruits, vegetables, etc., is not possible through trans-ship.

Residents demanded that the authorities should organise camps between Khelani and Trungal to properly distribute the essential commodities and medicines to the needy families.

As there is no chance of the construction of an alternative track between Assar and Trungal within 10 days, Khurshid Ahmed Bhat, who has deployed as OSD to supervise the relief operations, has rushed to Bani to accelerate ongoing work on opening the alternative road through Kathua. Meawhile, a high-level delegation of the BJP, led by Legislative Party leader Prof Chaman Lal Gupta, yesterday visited Assar to assess the ground situation.

BJP MLA Jugal Kishore Sharma, who reached the sunken spot, lambasted the government for its failure to provide basic amenities . 

Srinagar, February 15
Deputy Chief Minister Tara Chand said here today that Rs 554 crore had been sanctioned for the development of Srinagar city, including 133 crore for upgradation of sewerage and drainage, Rs 148 crore for the Tangnar water supply scheme of which Rs 33 crore had been already released.

Tara Chand was addressing a meeting of Srinagar corporators convened by him here today. Civic problems of Srinagar city were thoroughly discussed in the meeting.

The corporators stressed the need for beautification of Srinagar city, besides a better drainage and sewage.

Highlighting the plight of water-bodies in the city, the corporators demanded immediate measures to clean these. Some cases of structures having come up in the green zone of the city were also brought to the notice of the Deputy Chief Minister

Jammu, February 15
On the eve of another three-day statewide strike by government employees from tomorrow, CPM legislator MY Tarigami has urged the NC-Congress coalition government to take a positive view on the implementation of the 6th Pay Commission recommendations in favour of 4.5 lakh employees.

He also appealed to the employees to defer their proposed strike.

However, the joint consultative committee (JCC) spearheading the agitation has decided to go ahead with its strike call.

In a statement issued here today Tarigami said need was to resume negotiations between to work out the modalities for implementation of the pay panel recommendations.

He felt that the government should also meet other genuine demands for regularisation of daily- wage, ad-hoc and contractual employees.

Meawhile, employees joint action committee (EJAC) and JCC member Ram Kumar Sharma said the employees would go ahead with the proposed strike call.

"We held a meeting with Finance, Law and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Abdul Rahim Rather on February 13. Though the dialogue would continue the strike call cannot be deferred," he said.

The Finance Minister conveyed that the Chief Minister Omar Abdullah wanted to meet “us but without chalking out the modalities, we don't think meeting Omar would serve any purpose,” he added.

Since Omar was the head of state he should come out with some modalities, said Sharma, adding that government employees had been resorting to strikes in the past as well and there was nothing wrong in adopting a similar course this time.

Udhampur, February 15
Claiming to be guardian of the interests of people of Jammu region, the Jammu and Kashmir National Panthers Party (JKNPP) has been facing criticism from all quarters for supporting the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the NC in Rajya Sabha elections held on Friday.

Three of the two JKNPP members had supported PDP candidate Altaf Bukhari while as one party MLA supported NC candidate. Interestingly, the JKNPP had contested the just concluded Assembly elections on the plank of safeguarding interests of the people of Jammu region and the party had vowed to expose “misdeeds” of the NC and the PDP.

“This is the glaring example of opportunism and sabotaging”, Pawan Khajuria, state president of the BJYM, stated while reacting to the decision of JKNPP members to support, what he alleged, the anti-Jammu PDP and the NC. “In the Assembly elections the JKNPP had sought support of the people to protect their interests in Jammu region but for some personnel interests the party has comprised with the dignity and honour of the people of the region”. Rebel Congress leader RS Pathania termed action of JKNPP MLAs as “worst instance of opportunism, blackmailing and horse-trading”. “The JKNPP had supported the PDP which has been propagating anti-national agenda”, he said, and asked JKNPP leaders to clear their stand on self-rule, demilitarisation and revoke of the special Armed Forces Act.

“JKNPP leaders have back-stabbed people of Jammu region as the party got an overwhelming support from the people in Udhampur, Ramnagar and Samba with a hope that Panthers leaders would protect dignity and honour of Dogras”, he said, adding that, JKNPP MLAs have supported the NC and the PDP which opposed allotment of land to the Shrine Board.

Jammu, February 15
Former Chief Minister and PDP patron Mufti Mohammad Sayeed today called for adopting a fresh approach to address the state's economic and fiscal woes. "The continuing arbitrary exploitation of our water resources must end to safeguard our economic interests," he said.

Addressing a party activists' convention here, the Mufti said: "The state's natural and water resources need to be freed from the current exploitative arrangement that has doomed its economy, reducing it to a begging bowl."

Instead of looking for packages and doles, the state's political leadership must bring into focus the "unfair treatment" being meted out to the state on the economic front. He said the PDP would launch a concerted struggle to protect the political, economic interests of the state and the party legislators would forcefully raise such crucial issues in the coming session of the legislature.

The former CM said the unqualified surrender of the state's water resources by various regimes was an instance of total insensitivity towards its people. "It is a pity that while the rest of the country enjoys electricity generated from our water resources, we are forced to live in darkness," he said.

Referring to the collapse of the Batote-Doda road, the Mufti said it was an irony that a major chunk of the state's population spread over a vast area in the Chenab valley region that housed most power projects, instead of drawing any economic benefit was today suffering the most because of the "unfair and unrestrained exploitation" of the area's natural resources.

"The state's political leadership should, with fresh resolve, bring into focus the unfair treatment that has been meted out to us as a result of the discriminatory Indus Water Treaty (IWT) and the arbitrary exploitation of our water resources by the NHPC," he said. "To our economic prosperity is linked the future of our young boys and girls, who otherwise are forced to look towards Class-IV jobs for sustenance," he said.

"With the surrender of our rights on water, our premier resource, the government is ironically now forced to look to the Centre for even its salary bill," said the PDP patron, adding that the state's present arrangement with the NHPC should be reviewed to safeguard our economic interests as was being done by other states.

Jammu, February 15
Stressing an increase in the allocation for the farming and allied sectors in next year’s budget, state CPM secretary and Kulgam MLA MY Tarigami has said agriculture and horticulture being the primary sectors of the state’s economy be accorded priority. In a statement here , Tarigami said to safeguard the interests of peasants, the government should give special attention to agriculture and allied sectors, as these were providing livelihood to over 20 lakh people of the state, directly or indirectly.

He maintained that due to lesser attention toward these sectors the state had become a good consumer and a bad producer as imports worth hundreds of crores were registered annually within the state. He said the estimates were bewildering with indications of increasing imports to the state though a vast potential was available under agriculture and allied sectors.

The peasants, Tarigami said, were the worst sufferers of natural calamities as well as price rise, besides suffering from want of inputs, fertilisers, pesticides and other required assistance. He said the transfer of technology from lab to land in an efficient and effective way was also awaited in these sectors.

Reiterating his demand for the implementation of crop and livestock insurance policies in the state, Tarigami said only these schemes could back up the farming community in the event of a natural calamity. The use of post-harvest technology and lack of better marketing facilities was another area of concern for the cultivators, he added. 

Srinagar, February 15
Expressing dismay over the acute power crisis in the valley, the Opposition People’s Democratic Party (PDP) today asked the government to come up with a result-oriented action plan to deal with the crisis.

“Result-oriented short-term as well as long-term action plan is needed to deal with the acute power crisis particularly in the valley,” senior PDP leaders and MLAs Mohammad Sartaj Madni, Rafi Ahmad Mir, Abdul Haq Khan and Mushtaq Ahmad Shah said in a joint statement here.

They said the entire Kashmir valley was reeling under complete darkness with scheduled and unscheduled power cuts on rise and the transmission and distribution systems out of order, forcing people to come out on streets to protest against the mismanagement of the Power Development Department.

“Most of the rural areas were steeping into darkness because of the callousness of the department,” they said. The leaders alleged that the people protesting for power supply are dealt with batons and thrashed in streets for demanding the basic necessity. — PTI

Jammu, February 15
The Civil Defence of Jammu today demonstrated a mock drill to train around 1,400 Jammu residents, including school and college students, to save causalities in case of an eventuality that arises due to a natural disaster or a probable terrorist attack.

As part of the ‘walk-cum-run’ organised by the Civil Defence of Jammu that was flagged off by Director-General of Police Kuldeep Khoda today, the department held various rescue drills to train residents of Jammu to deal with various eventualities.

“We held demonstrations of how to rescue people from being drowning and we trained students to save people from gushing water,” said Khaleel Rehman, Dy controller, Civil Defence, Jammu.

The drill was carried out in the gushing water of the Tawi near Har Ki Pawri. “The water current is very strong there, so we selected that spot to carry out the drill. Live demonstration was carried out to train people how to save the life of person who gets caught in such a fast current without risking ones own life,” Rehman said.

The department also held demonstrations of how to save people who get caught in a fire.

“Many times it had happened that when terrorists take shelter in a house and in the ensuing encounter the house catches fire, we demonstrated in front of the people as how to avoid human causality,” he said.

The participants, who came to witness and take part in the drill, said such type of drills gave them an opportunity to learn how to save the lives of people in case of a natural disaster or a terrorist attack.

Earlier, the Civil Defence, Jammu, organised a ‘walk-cum-race’ from Gulshan Ground to Bahu Fort in which more than 2,000 people, including school and college students took part.

Srinagar, February 15
Pahalgam, the world famous tourist resort, was the coldest place in he valley while Drass was the coldest in Ladakh region.

A weather office spokesman said here today that the minimum temperature at Pahalgam, base camp of the holy Amarnath cave, was recorded at -2.6°C, coldest in the valley.

The frontier district of Kupwara in north Kashmir was the second coldest with minimum temperature at -1.1°C. However, in Srinagar, the temperature was recorded at 2.1°C today morning.

The day temperature in the valley at all places was above normal yesterday and today owing to bright sunshine.

Drass, the second coldest place in the world, recorded -10°C at some places, while nearby Kargil was at -4°C.

People criticised the Power Development Department for unscheduled and frequent power failure in almost all parts of the valley.

Meanwhile, unscheduled power curtailment and damaged roads forced people to take to streets in different parts of the valley.

Almost all roads, particularly in Srinagar city and other major towns were damaged, affecting the normal movement of vehicles. — UNI

Srinagar, February 15
During search operations, the police and 51 battalion of the BSF unearthed a hideout in the Paner forests falling under Bandipore police station.

One pistol, two pistol magazines, seven AK rifle magazines, 452 AK rifle rounds, 452 rounds, nine UBGL shells, one hand grenade, 44 rounds of UMG belt ammunition, five wireless sets, and one pouch were seized from the hideout. However, no terrorist was found in the hideout.