KL Report
SRINAGAR
National Conference on Saturday termed its coalition partner Congress as a ‘selfish party’ that wants political gains out of creation of new administrative units in the state.
Talking to KNS, Dr Mustafa Kamal, NC’s additional general secretary observed that the delay in preparing the report by the Congress led Cabinet Sub Committee (CSC) on creation of new administrative units is as good as hiding the report.
“Their (Congress) intentions seem wrong. This is a selfish party and sensing that it will get routed in Jammu and Kashmir like other parts of the country, it wants political benefits out of the new administrative units. We want this exercise should benefit people in general,” Kamal opined.
Allaying apprehensions expressed by certain Congress leaders that creation of new administrative units will put an additional burden on the already deficit state exchequer, Kamal said that state is already managing its affairs with the funds received from the government of India and the proposed expenditure on new administrative units will also be managed from those funds.
“Our income at present is RS 7000 Crores and the rest we get from the Government of India. Anyway, the expenditure will come on second stage. Congress is worried about colour of chickens before they are being hatched. Does it mean that the two reports prepared by the two committees including Mushtaq Ganaie and S S Beloria were an exercise in futility?” he questioned.
The NC additional general secretary remarked that the National Conference want to remove anomalies created by the PDP-Congress coalition government since 2002 to 2008 by creating new administrative units in areas which were left out by the then government.
“Why they (Congress) are delaying this report is just because they would get exposed as many areas which genuinely deserved new administrative units were ignored by the then coalition government. That is why we want to create these units judiciously and in a transparent manner,” Kamal told KNS.
Asked about Chief Minister Omar Abdullah’s assertion that he will resign if the CSC fails to submit its report before the state cabinet within the deadline fixed by Omar, the NC additional general secretary said: “Yes. Omar means it. He is particular about it because he want to help people by providing them governance at their doorsteps.”
Kamal said that Congress is delaying the formation of CSC report because it wants the whole exercise to be carried out on its own terms which the NC will never allow to happen. “Congress wants to benefit the areas which it has already taken care of during its previous stint of governance in the state. We want the people to get benefited out of this exercise.”
He said that the whole exercise is yet to undergo public scrutiny as the CSC report after being submitted to the cabinet will be put in the public domain to elicit public opinion.
