Political fight erupts over amended panchayat Bill

Arteev Sharma

Tribune News Service

Jammu, July 1

A political storm has broken out over passage of the amended panchayati raj Bill in the Legislative Assembly on the last day of the Budget session in Srinagar on Thursday with various groups and stakeholders accusing the PDP-BJP government of making all-out efforts to weaken the panchayati raj system in the state.

Leading the charge, former Chief Minister and National Conference (NC) working president Omar Abdullah alleged that it was an overt attempt to weaken the system by scuttling democratic principles and introducing the indirect process of election of sarpanch, making a window for coercion, corruption and malpractices to manipulate elections.

“This is likely to have far-reaching consequences and eventually discredit and weaken the panchayati raj system in the state,” he stated in a memorandum submitted by party leaders during a meeting with Governor NN Vohra at Raj Bhawan in Srinagar today.

For the crucial goal of protecting the panchayati raj system in the state, the NC urged the Governor to return the Bill for reconsideration if and when it was passed by the Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Council and sent to the Governor for his assent.

The Assembly passed the Jammu and Kashmir Panchayati Raj (Amendment) Bill, 2016, on Thursday, which was aimed at making a provision for election of sarpanches by panches instead of being elected directly.

Harsh Dev Singh, chairman of the Jammu and Kashmir National Panthers Party, described the move as “highly regressive and retrograde” and accused the government of trying to sabotage the empowerment of rural folk.

“The incorporated amendments will completely alter the structure of panchayati raj as envisaged under the existing Act. The move of the ruling coalition is suicidal as indirect elections of sarpanches and election of one chairman for a cluster of blocks is wholly opposed to the spirit of the 73rd Amendment and the concept of local self-government,” he said.

Anil Sharma, state president of the All Jammu Kashmir Panchayat Conference (AJKPC) described the Bill as a “black law” which had been passed to weaken and eventually crush democracy at the grassroots.

“The indirect election of sarpanches instead of being elected by the people will only encourage money and muscle power, besides giving birth to several malpractices. This is a black law and will be opposed tooth and nail. The AJKPC will mobilise the rural populace and launch a vigorous agitation to defeat ill intention of the state government,” he said.

The state Congress had already opposed the amendments in the panchayati raj Bill and threatened to launch an agitation if the Bill was not withdrawn. “The amendments in the Bill will bring drastic changes in the panchayati Raj system, which will go against the spirit of the 73rd Amendment of the Indian Constitution,” the party had said.