Probe sought into works completed under B2V prog

Tribune News Service

Jammu/Kathua, November 21

Elected panchayat members today requested Lieutenant-Governor (L-G) GC Murmu to hold an inquiry into the number of development works, identified by the government under the first phase of the “Back to village” (B2V) programme, that have been completed in Jammu and Kashmir.

They described the exercise as a “total flop show, drama and eyewash” and alleged that the J&K Government had misled Prime Minister Narendra Modi by giving a big hype to B2V programme.

“The J&K government cannot prove that they have initiated even a single work under the B2V during the past six months. It is a total drama enacted by the government to pretend that officials were sent from the Secretariat to villages, but nothing has changed on the ground till date,” Shafiq Mir, chairman, All Jammu Kashmir Panchayat Conference (AJKPC), told reporters here.

Yesterday, the UT government announced the launch of the second phase of the B2V programme from November 25 and disclosed that over 5,000 gazetted officers would visit over 4,000 panchayats and spend two days and a night in every panchayat for “decentralised development”.

Mir, who was recently elected the BDC (block development council) chairman, alleged that the government had failed to fulfil the demands made by the villagers during the first phase of the B2V programme.

“Under the MGNREGA programme, Rs 800 crore liabilities of poor labourers have not been cleared by the government. The J&K government officials have misled the L-G who must clarify as to how many works they have started and completed which were identified in the first phase of this programme in June this year,” Mir said.

The AJKPC leader said the government should send same officials to same villages so that they should face people on ground for the promises they made to them six months ago.

Meanwhile, several sarpanhces of Kathua district also put a question mark on the B2V programme and described the exercise as “wastage of time”.

“The government has announced to again start the second phase of this programme to listen to the problems of villagers, but we want to know what happened to the problems they raised during the first phase of the programme,” Vicky Sharma, a sarpanch, said.

“If the government has not been able to address the issues raised by villagers during the programme, there is no logic to hold similar programme,” he said.