Jammu, June 30
Not deterred by frequent road mishaps in the Jammu region, private transport operators in Jammu continue to flout traffic norms by resorting to overloading, overspeeding and playing music in their vehicles, thus risking the lives of commuters.

Private transport in Jammu is considered the only major source of transportation in the region.But the people here allege that the operators continue to flout the norms and resort to overspeeding.

“These operators do not seem to have learnt a lesson from the frequent road mishaps that have taken place in the region. Hundreds of people have so far lost their lives in such accidents, but the drivers continue to risk our lives,” said Harmeet Singh, a resident of the Panjtirthi locality of Jammu.

The commuters say that the law-enforcing agencies in Jammu have become a mute spectator and take bribes from the law violators. “The traffic police seems to be least bothered about the open violation of the law as they resort to taking bribes from the violators. Money plays a big role and the traffic police personnel openly allow the transporters to violate the norms,” said Saroj Kumar, a local resident.

Sources in the traffic police say the department has not seen any reforms for the past many decades and lacks manpower to control the traffic law violations.

“There has been no recruitment to the traffic police in the past many years on the one hand and on the other hand traffic in Jammu has increased manifold. We cannot man every crossing or every point to check the violation by the transporters,” said a senior traffic police officer.

He said, “Time and again we have been requesting the state government to increase our strength and to provide us more powers so that we can check the menace of overloading, overspeeding and all other rule violations”.

He said the department conducted surprise checks and put special nakas to challan the violators, but the transporters resorted to innovative ways to break the rules.

Srinagar, June 30
Senior trainers of civil defence organised a mock drill to train volunteers about the use of ropes in search and rescue operations during a two-day disaster preparedness training programme for tackling accidents on the national highways (NHs).

The programme was organised by the divisional administration, Kashmir, and Action Aid.

Dilbagh Singh, Inspector-General of Police, while presiding over the valedictory function, said a proposal had been submitted to the government under which a couple of volunteers in each village would be trained in first aid, search, rescue and firefighting so that they could act as immediate responders.

“Hundreds of deaths occur every year due to road accidents on the Qazigund-Banihal stretch along the Srinagar-Jammu National Highway. The issue is serious and it has to be addressed to,” said the IGP. He assured that a comprehensive programme would be taken up to train volunteers.

Dilbagh Singh said two companies of the auxillary wing of the Jammu and Kashmir Police were being trained as state disaster response force to tackle any disaster.

The fire and emergency services department displayed their advance rescue tender (ART), including tools like fire suits, chemical suits, chain saws, slab cutters, spreaders, thermal cameras and sunglasses.

Dr Sami Deva, health officer, Action Aid, together with Dr Mashooq provided first-aid training to the participants.

Dr GM Dar, in charge, disaster management department of the Institute of Management and Public Administration (IMPA), Srinagar, said disasters, both natural as well as manmade, caused havoc.

“Accident-related disasters are quite common. It is important that preparedness is done at all levels. Vulnerability assessment should be done and the zoning and land management policy should be pursued by the government,” said Dr Dar.

Urging upon the involvement of departments like revenue, police, fire and emergency services and health in disaster preparedness, he said that would help in getting better results.

“Around 80,000 hectares of land is prone to floods in the Kashmir valley while in Ladakh, windstorms lead to disasters,” he said.

Dr Dar said 5,92,537 deaths had taken place all over the world due to disasters during 1990-2000 and during the same time, 196 million people had been affected.

“We have come to learn safety tips and measures to be adopted to mitigate losses during disasters. It has been a great learning experience for us,” said Mohammad Khaliq, a participant.

Khaliq’s co-participants, including Sameer Ahmad, said the group could carry back the message to thousands.

Forty volunteers selected from villages falling on the Srinagar-Jammu National Highway between Qazigund and Banihal were imparted training, who were also awarded certificates.

Jammu, June 30
Even as uncovered manholes in the city pose threat to residents, it seems that the Municipal Corporation is not bothered. Uncovered manholes on the main road in Shastri Nagar and in the Gole Market, Gandhi Nagar, are posing a threat to motorists.

Besides being threat to motorists, these uncovered manholes are dangerous for commuters as well as for stray animals.

In Shastri Nagar, the lid of a manhole has been stolen a week ago, which is posing threat to commuters. Residents said they had made several representations to the authorities in the regard but nobody paid any heed to these.

“For the last seven days this manhole has been left uncovered and it is giving an invitation to any untoward incident any time but still the authorities are not paying any attention to it,” said Abhinandan Gupta, a shopkeeper whose shop is situated only a few steps away from this manhole.

The lid of an another manhole in the Gole market, Gandhi Nagar, has got damaged. “Nobody is listening. Is the civic body waiting for some tragedy to happen?” asks Gurpal Singh, a resident of the area. The residents said open manholes were posing threat to commuters, especially during the night.

Mentioning that a number of times in different areas many people have fallen in uncovered manholes, Yogesh Gupta, another resident, said, “Leaving a manhole open is a serious lapse for which action should be initiated against corporation officials. This shows the casual approach of the corporation”.

The entire city is dug up for the laying of drainage pipes by different agencies. No major road or lane has been spared in the city where drainage pipes have not been laid. But all manholes of these drains have not been covered before through such roads open for traffic.

Around two uncovered manholes are threatening motorists near the Science College road. The road being narrow and the rush of the traffic increased manyfold, these manholes become a reason for constant jams daily.

The shopkeepers of the area said many scooterists had been caught unawares here and had broken their bones in accidents. On many occasions, sudden sights of these manholes by the drivers had resulted into crashing of vehicles, said the shopkeepers. They added that many children also walked on the road and the manholes posed a threat to their lives.

The problem gets compounded during the night when defunct streetlights make it impossible for anybody to anticipate the open manholes. “We have complained to the authorities a number of times but to no avail. May be they are waiting for a tragedy to wake them up from their slumber,” complained a commuter, who escaped an accident on the spot.

The problem exists not only in Shastri Nagar, Gandhi Nagar and Jewel Chowk, but also in every locality in this city.

Babu Ram, joint commissioner, Jammu Municipal Corporation, assured that he would take immediate action to cover all these manholes and would also ask the officials that why these manholes were left open in these areas.

Kathua, June 30
Attribute it to the lax attitude of the government or farmers’ disinterest, six years on when Jammu and Kashmir had embarked upon the cultivation of jatropha curcas in 2003 to extract cost effective bio-diesel so as to replace high-cost fossil fuel, the project has run into rough weather.

In 2003, the National Oil Seeds and Vegetable Oil Board had released funds running into lakhs of rupees and some NGOs in collaboration with the Command Area Development (CAD) planted five lakh jatropha curcas saplings on the wastelands of Kathua and Samba districts.

The project today stands nowhere, fumes Mool Raj, one of the farmers, who had planted saplings and seeds on 40 per cent of his land in Dayalachak.

A team of the board, which had come to assess the progress in 2006, was disappointed by the poor performance, he added.

We were encouraged to take up jatropha curcas cultivation and we do planted saplings and seeds but thereafter things didn’t proceed further, said Mohan Lal, another farmer.

Jatropha curcas (called rattanjyot in common parlance) needs proper pruning, fertilisers and irrigation water, which didn’t come our way and now six years later, most of the farmers here have abandoned its cultivation, he added.

The board had provided funds directly to some NGOs and the CAD had provided technical expertise to the farmers, sources in the CAD said.

A minimum support price to the farmers under a buy-back policy had also been announced and a state-level nodal agency, too, had been constituted, but thereafter the project didn’t proceed further because of the lax attitude of the state government, they added.

However, a CAD official attributed the failure of jatropha cultivation in the state to the disinterest among the farmers.

“They are not happy with its cultivation and at the same time they didn’t contribute their bit to make the project a success,” he said while refusing to identify reasons responsible for disenchantment among the farmers.

Though some of the plantations done in 2004, 2005 and 2006 still exist on bunds, compact plantations were removed by the farmers, he added.

The CAD had carried first-ever survey in 2003 in the dry land (Kandi) areas of the state like Kathua and Samba to explore the possibilities of cultivating jatropha curcas so as to extract bio-diesel.

He described jatropha cultivation a failure in the state. Being eco-friendly, having 100 per cent combustion, the Centre had also announced a support price of Rs 20 per litre for the jatropha methyl ester, the bio-diesel that had to be extracted.

However, CAD director Nirmal Sharma maintained that the department had been doing everything possible for its cultivation and at the same time has several plans up its sleeves under the Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojna.

Much hype and hoopla had been created when the CAD had imported seeds from Punjab, out of which 38,000 of its saplings were planted in more than 80 hectares in the Vijaypur block.

Jammu, June 30
Hundreds of migrants from Doda, who had left their homes as they refused to betray their motherland, have fallen prey to the government apathy and are subjected to various hardships.

The migrants have been living in Belicharna village of Jammu for the past 10 years. Militants forced their young ones to join their ranks, but they stood against it and decided to fight back, many were killed and the rest had no option but to leave everything behind and migrate to Jammu.

More than 10 years have passed when around 250 families from Doda migrated to Jammu. “I have seven sons and one day militants came to my house and wanted me to send three of my sons with them to get arms training. When I refused, they thrashed me up, breaking both my hands,” said Mohammed Sikandar, a resident of Gundhoh village in Doda district, who migrated to Jammu after facing threats from militants.

He said, “When I did not give up to their demands, they kidnapped my youngest son and demanded Rs 5 lakh as extortion money. They released my son only after I paid the money. He was severely tortured. After that we decided to leave the area and migrated to Jammu”.

Mohammed Sikandar is not the only one who was forced by militants to migrate from Doda. All 250 families have a similar tale to tell.

“Our fault was that we refused to send our family members to take arms against our own country. We migrated to Jammu to save ourselves from militants’ wrath and now we are dying due to the apathetic attitude of the state government,” said Jameela Begum, who was severely thrashed by militants on her refusal to send her husband across the border.

“It was in 2002 when some armed militants entered our house and wanted to take me along for arms training, but somehow I managed to flee. In a fit of rage, they (militants) killed my aunt and seriously injured my mother,” said 27-year-old Ali Hussain.

The Doda migrants, who live in a makeshift colony in the Belicharna area on the banks of the Tawi, blame the successive state governments for ignoring them. As after more than 10 years of their migration, they haven’t got any relief from the government.

“We are paying the price for patriotism. We are living in this flood-prone colony, which, too, is illegal. Out of the 250 families, only 12 are getting relief,” said Khalid Hussan, a migrant.

“We had approached the court, which had given its ruling in our favour, asking the state government to treat us at par with the Kashmiri Pandit migrants, but years have passed since, we are still waiting for any sort of relief from the government,” Khalid said.

The legislative party leader of the JKNPP, Harsh Dev Singh, who has taken up the issue of Doda migrants in the Assembly a number of times, said, “Since Doda is also a militancy infested area like Kashmir, we have been demanding that these Doda migrants should be treated at par with their Kashmiri counterparts”.

Upper Kangri (Sunder Bani), June 30
It’s 11:30 pm and the time for midnight wake-up call for residents of Polwal village. They are sitting on their haunches around a small water body with mugs and tubs waiting for their turn. It takes an hour or sometime even more to fill a bucket.

Here, people who don’t get water in noon do not sleep at night. They keep guarding springs waiting for their turn. The residents also hunt for low-lying surface of seasonal streams to collect stagnant brownish water for household purposes and livestock.

Villages in Upper Kangri panchayat, 94 km from Jammu in Sunder Bani tehsil, are in the grip of severe water crisis due to scorching heat and delayed monsoon.

Situated near the LoC, residents of Palwal, Seri, Gordhi, Gidhpur, Powal, Thangar, Kanora, Amb Khor, Ghai Pnyaas and Madyaal villages are planning to migrate if the situation continues to deteriorate.

Most of these villages are yet to be electrified even after the 60 years of Independence. Only a few got supply lines a few years ago.

Visit any household and you would find it challenging to drink a glass of water or a cup of tea offered to you as a token of courtesy. Besides its brownish colour, the water gives a foul smell that would soon choke your throat making it difficult to get down that amount of water in a single go.

Women filter water with their dupattas first and later boil it, but it still tastes bitter to the person who drinks it.

Water-borne diseases are quite prevalent in these villages. “Our children and old people in particular keep on complaining about pain in stomach and throat,” Bhim Sen, a panch, complained.

“Villagers have to drive their cattle for several km looking for water. Rearing livestock is becoming impossible and people have started selling them of,” he added.

The villagers said ther were frequent arguments and scuffles on water quite frequently. In every home, you will find stockpile of washable clothes, which have been kept in wait for rain. “Two months ago, we had washed clothes and bed sheets after harvesting rain water on rooftops,” revealed Rakhi Devi, adding that, “We shifted here recently and having spent around Rs six lakh on our home we are repenting”.

“If the condition remains same, we will have to shift to some other place,” she said, and requested, “I want to convey it to the authorities. Please don’t ignore us, we, too, are human beings, we, too, have the right to live. Don’t treat us like animals”.

The villagers said since the onset of the summer, only one supply tanker of the Public Health Engineering (PHE) department visited Polwal village.

Jammu, June 30
One of the main tourist attractions of Jammu, the Bagh-e-Bahu Fort has been losing its sheen, thanks to the unhygienic conditions prevailing there. On an average, around 40,000 people, including those on pilgrimage to Vaishno Devi and Amarnath shrine, visit the city daily. And a majority of the tourists prefer to visit the Bagh-e-Bahu Fort as well.

But the visitors have to face disappointment due to the poor sanitary conditions at the fort. Some visitors here say that due to the official negligence their visit to the Bagh-e-Bahu has turned out to be a nightmare.

Expressing regret, a tourist, Rajesh Basu from Bengal, said, “We are charged an entrance fee of Rs 10 per head, including small children, but the maintenance is negligible”.

Though the use of polythene bags has been prohibited in the state, used carry bags and empty sachets of snacks can be seen scattered in every corner of the garden.

“The administration should either post adequate staff and provide dustbins at a number of places or ban the carrying and sale of eatables inside the park,” said Mandeep Singh, a tourist from Punjab.

The adverse impact of water shortage in this famous tourist spot can be gauged from the fact the grass along the slops is so thin that the slops look rocky when seen from a distance.

Most of the water coolers installed inside the park are lying defunct and the fountains, too, are not in the working condition.

“I checked all water coolers, but found all defunct. Only one water cooler installed at the entrance provides water, but in drops and one has to wait for five minutes to get a glass full of water from it,” said Prinka Tiwari, a tourist from Gujarat.

An official of the state floriculture department said, “Some of the water coolers and the fountains have been restored while other would be restored shortly. We are striving hard to provide better amenities to the visitors.”

Kathua, June 30
The government-owned State Road Transport Corporation (SRTC) loses huge revenue every day to private transporters on the Kathua-Jammu sector.

This is evident from the fact that the SRTC has no bus service at all to join these two important districts of the Jammu region. On the contrary, the private transporters press into service 110 buses every day on this stretch of 90 km that passes through important towns like Vijaypur, Samba, Ghagwal, Hiranagar, Chadwal, Dayalachack and Rajbagh.

In the absence of the government-owned transport facility, the private transporters literary call shots, as they run the service on their own terms. “There is no check on the fare as well as the speed with which these buses run,” said Vishal Sharma, a state government employee, who shuttles between Jammu and Kathua daily.

Sharma wondered how speed could be directly linked with fare. “Those drivers who claim to run their buses very fast charge more. The private transporters have accordingly categorised their vehicles as ‘super fast’, `mail’ and `express buses’”, he said.

Sanjay Kumar, another commuter, said, “Had there been a proper bus service, the commuters would not have to face hardships. The private transporters don’t care two hoots for rules and regulations. For them, overloading is common. They net a huge profit, which should have normally gone to the government”.

Echoing similar views, a Jammu-based bank employee posted at Dayalachack, said, he preferred to travel by Punjab Roadways buses that were cozy and comfortable and did not resort to overloading. “However, their schedule does not match with our office timings,” he added.

Anuradha, an engineering student, remarked that the SRTC might be claiming to have operated passenger buses to as far as Khardung La Pass in Ladakh or a cross-border bus between Srinagar and Muzaffarabad, but intriguingly, the corporation had completely ignored this region.

Since SRTC has no buses to ply on the Kathua-Jammu route, the bus stand in Kathua wears a deserted look most of the times. Inaugurated by the then Governor, Gen KV Krishna Rao, on December 8, 1994, this bus stand, which is cut off from the main town, is in a deplorable condition. It, however, houses a cabin where the SRTC has posted a booking clerk.

Swaran Singh, the booking clerk, admitted that due to the non-availability of the buses, the corporation had suspended its Kathua- Jammu bus service. “Earlier, we had regular buses on this sector. Further, a number of SRTC buses have presently been pressed into service to ferry Amarnath pilgrims”, he said.

Raghubir Singh, a member of the Kathua-Jammu Private Transport Service, said, “We have elegant and comfortable buses that operate after every seven minutes’’.

Srinagar, June 30
A number of Kashmiri writers, poets and scholars assembled at Mahnoor, the native village of Moti Lal Saqi, a doyen of the Kashmiri language and literature, on his 10th death anniversary observed recently. It was also a homecoming for the family members of late Moti Lal Raina (Saqi), when his wife, Parmeshwari, and their son, Vijay Saqi, assembled to pay their tributes at the poet’s ancestral house at Mahnoor, Chadoora, 34 km from Budgam district.

About 20 migrant Kashmiri Pandit writers, poets and scholars assembled for the first time in the village to pay homage to Saqi. The programme was organised by the Jammu and Kashmir Academy of Art, Culture and Languages in the lawn of the ancestral house owned by Saqi.

Minister for Finance and Parliamentary Affairs Abdul Rahim Rather was the chief guest while prominent litterateurs from across the state attended. They included Mohan Lal Aash, Mohammad Yousuf Taing, Prof Rehman Rahi, Ghulam Nabi Khayal, Moti Lal Masroof, Mohan Lal Aash, Syed Rasul Pompur, Ghulam Nabi Aatash, Iqbal Faheem, Tanha Nizami, Shabnam Tilgami and Prof Mishal Sultanpuri.

It was after a gap of 10 years after the death of the poet that such a function was organised at his village in his memory. Saqi, a poet and writer, who served in different capacities in the state during his lifetime, died in 1999 in Delhi.

Describing the poet and writer as an ardent supporter of secularism, who contributed a lot through his artistic work to propagate real Kashmiriyat, Abdul Rahim said words fell short to describe the multifaceted personality of Saqi, who besides being a great writer, also possessed qualities of a great human being. He recalled the unparallel contribution of Saqi for the preservation of Kashmiri culture and ethos.

He held that the state government was committed to the development cultural heritage of the state. He said the promotion of culture was the government’s priority and the autonomous character of the state academy would be safeguarded and protected at any cost.

Zaffar Iqbal Manhas, secretary, Academy of Art, Culture and Languages, said the Kashmiri speaking masses had to come forward to promote their language through various means. He said Saqi was a great soul and was a cultural luminary who by virtue of his writings served the cultural heritage of Kashmir in a big way. He said Saqi had deep insight over the cultural affairs of the state and had dedicated his whole life for the promotion and development of such traditions. He revealed that the poet was instrumental in making “Encyclopedia Kashmiriyana” a success, adding that he was a poet of high repute and caliber having diction and style of his own.

Earlier, the minister presented a shawl and a memento to the widow of the poet who visited her native town after the gap of 20 years.

The special issue of Sheeraza Kashmiri edited by Zaffar Muzafar dedicated to Saqi was also released on the occasion. Several papers were read out highlighting life and contributions of the poet and speakers on the occasion described him as an encyclopedia on Kashmir. A state-level mushaira was also organised in which Kashmiri poets across the state participated.