Mufti faces uphill task as new faces come with little experience

Arun Joshi

Tribune News Service

Jammu, March 1

Newly elected Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed who hailed the formation of the PDP-BJP government as a turning point in the history of Jammu and Kashmir to make the state a haven of peace, seems a worried man on the governance front.

His Council of Ministers gives an all new look --- most of them are new to the legislature and have no experience of running the government.

Given the situation, Mufti Sayeed will have to work harder to deliver on the governance front. He had sought votes on the basis of good governance, and now when the government has been formed, he cannot say that he is not in a hurry. The people are impatient. They want good governance.

This 25-member Council of Ministers can count only three ministers who have the experience of being in the government in the past. They are Abdul Rehman Veeri, Lal Singh and Javed Mustafa Mir. All others are new, including Deputy Chief Minister Nirmal K Singh.

“These are the inexperienced lot and would not know how to carry along the bureaucracy in the state,” said a BJP leader.

But Mufti can draw satisfaction that some of the brightest minds and politicians connected with the people and recognise their difficulties have ideas to address grievances of the people.

Haseeb Drabu, a renowned economist, was economic advisor to the Mufti Sayeed and Ghulam Nabi Azad’s governments in the past. As the Chairman of J&K Bank, he knows the art of governance.

His acumen lies in his substantive power of arguments and articulation. This man who negotiated with the BJP for over two months to bring out “Agenda for Alliance” knows the affairs of the state.

Abdul Rehman Veeri is a four-time MLA from the Bijbehara constituency of south Kashmir. He knows the government working as he was the minister in the previous coalition government headed by Mufti Sayeed and Azad (2002-2008). His knowledge of the land, people and the administration is rated as superb.

Syed Altaf Bukhari, a businessman, is a man who earned a special lace among people by his work during the floods. While his own house was damaged by the floodwaters in September last year, he sheltered and fed several hundred people for weeks. This man has been dealing with the ministers and people for quite some time. He can really make a difference in the government for he has known the government from close quarters before entering into it.

Nirmal Singh, Deputy Chief Minister, brings with him a lot of experience of organsational work and as the former president of the state unit of the BJP, he has interacted with the government at various levels and is a man with a clean image.

As a Cabinet minister in the Mufti Sayeed government (2002-2005), former Congressman Lal Singh had made the Heath and Medical Education Department to function. He was the Health Minister. He was elected to the Lok Sabha in 2004 and 2009.

But to make others work is an uphill task because they have little knowledge how the government functions and how things are handled in a delicate manner.

CM to chair his first Cabinet meet today

Newly sworn-in Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed will chair his first Cabinet meeting on Monday at 10 am in the civil secretariat here. Mufti along with 24 ministers of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the BJP took oath today in Jammu. He is back as the Chief Minister more than nine years after he left the chair for Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad in November 2005. This time he formed the government with the BJP after hectic consultation on forming an “Agenda of Alliance” document, which will be a base for running the government in the state. Before chairing the Cabinet meeting, Mufti will take the guard of honour at the secretariat. The first task of the government after the Cabinet meeting will be to cast their votes in the Legislative Council elections in the Assembly complex. The PDP-BJP coalition is facing a tough task to win four of the five seats of the Legislative Council.