KL Report
SRINAGAR
Hitting at the government, the Kashmir based civic contractors Saturday reiterated that Jammu and Ladakh regions are being favored at the cost of development in Kashmir. The contractors were reacting to the statement made by the concerned R&B Minister in the legislative assembly.
The minister informed the house that all the three regions of Jammu, Srinagar and Ladakh are getting equal share in allocation of development funds and that “it is the lethargic approach of the contractors that development works are not completed on time.”
Terming the statement as ‘old wine in new bottle’ the General Secretary of the Jammu and Kashmir Central Contractors Coordination Committee (JKCCCC), Farooq Ahmad Dar, said that state government is used to such behavior as it “just wants to save its skin out of sheer discrimination, being meted out to the Kashmir region.”
“The state government is used to say such things as it wants to absolve itself from favoring Jammu and Ladakh regions. It just wants to detour the facts regarding disparity in allocation of funds for developmental works in Kashmir,” Dar said.
“It is the best way to tackle the situation; government has chosen to blame contractors for its follies and failure regarding the time bound execution of developmental works. The Valley is being given a step motherly treatment as hundreds of crores of rupees have been diverted to Jammu and Ladakh and crores more are given to the two regions during the allocation of funds,” alleged Dar.
Retaliating back at the government for blaming the contractors for its incompetence and helplessness in delivering the things, Dar said that it (government) has stooped so low that it can now resort to any behavior to hide its poor governance and lack of accountability.
He added that despite knowing that Jammu and Ladakh regions are getting more developmental funds than Kashmir and payment bills are delayed in most of the works, the government easily held contractors accountable for failing to deliver the results on time.
“Government owes us outstanding bills worth Rs 200 crores. Belated release of money and then eating a huge share out of it is the only reason for in-completion of the development works on time,” Dar reacted.
