As usual the governor’s administration has stung another surprise by allotting districts to administrative secretaries to oversee and supervise the public outreach program “back to the village” in all the districts in all the three regions of Jammu & Kashmir state. The administrative secretaries would be visiting villages in districts just like the MLAs visit their constituencies at weekends to take stock of developmental programs during popular rule. Interestingly the officers at the grass root level according to a circular issued by General Administration Department (GAD) have been asked to interact with the panchayat members including sarpanchs for two days a week with a haltage of one night and report with the feed back to the administrative secretaries and this shows that officers posted in villages and towns would be reporting to administrative secretaries with the feedback on public grievances like the MLAs report to chief minister and ministers about the progress in the implementation of developmental programs during popular rule.
Interestingly the administrative secretaries have been allotted their home districts creating an impression that as if they are the nominated MLAs in their home districts. More interesting point to note is that Deputy Commissioners of the districts have been asked to decide the venues for weekly meetings of the administrative secretaries in the districts the way they decide venues of public darbars by the Chief Minister, ministers and legislators at the weekends in their districts during the popular rule in the state. Please note Asif Hameed Khan and Sheik Fayaz the residents of Srinagar have been allotted Srinagar district, Sarmad Hafeez resident of Srinagar district asked to hold charge of Budgam district in the neighbourhood of Srinagar, Farooq Lone resident of Kulgam gets charge of Kulgam district, Manzoor Lone resident of Kupwara district allotted Kupwara district, Asgar Hassan Samoon resident of Gurez Bandipora allotted Banndipora district and Rigzin Samphel resident of Leh gets charge of Leh district. Allotting home districts to administrative secretaries to carry out the public outreach program “Back to Village” shows that governor’s administration has suspended indefinitely the process of conducting early assembly election for early restoration of popular rule and taken arbitrarily a route to utilize the services of administrative secretaries for a public outreach program which by all means is the domain of the legislators and not the administrative secretaries . Governor’s administration using the services of bureaucrats for public outreach program “back to village” looking almost an attempt to give a political role to administrative secretaries in their home districts disputes claims on government’s preparedness on the conduct of early assembly elections for early restoration of popular rule in Jammu & Kashmir state.
