“The cash crunch at treasuries bringing people of all sectors under financial stress necessitates immediate intervention at the highest level.”
The reports about cash crunch in Government treasuries are obviously putting under stress the local economy particularly the contractors’ allotted contracts for civil construction works by the Government in Kashmir division. The unprecedented delays in the disbursement of overdue payments to Government contactors would consequently bring under huge stress even the livelihoods of people connected with the Government’s construction business if the payment system at treasuries is not immediately improved. Cash crunch bringing under financial stress the Government contractors would finally reduce the pace of development works in Kashmir division as finally the execution of civil construction works depends on the financial transactions in the civil construction sector of the Government anywhere in country and same holds good for Jammu & Kashmir. The anxieties over cash crunch are increasing even among both the serving and the retired Government employees as serving employees wait for immediate disbursement of their Provident Fund withdrawals and recently retired Government employees are desperate to receive their retirement benefits overdue to them. The cash crunch at treasuries bringing people of all sectors under financial stress necessitates immediate intervention at the highest level. Cash crunch shouldn’t have caused anxieties among the people the time when Chief Minister Omar Abdullah is himself holding the charge of key Finance portfolio.
“The cash crunch at the Government treasuries may be resolved timely by the hassle free disbursement of funds from the Centre if brought to its notice seriously but finally situation demands that Jammu & Kashmir Government carries out series of financial reforms to manage its finances efficiently with the planned initiatives to reduce all scopes for occurrence and re-occurrence of cash crisis in the Government departments.”
Had Jammu & Kashmir been a state as it was before 2019 the delays in allocations from the Central Government could have been an issue for some right reasons but in view of the experiences of the free flow of funds from centre to Jammu & Kashmir as a Union Territory during last more than five years does not leave any scope for any delay in flow of funds to Jammu & Kashmir from the Central Government. Fortunately Chief Minister Omar Abdullah has been invited for participation in a budget preparation meeting by Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and as such it is right time for the Chief Minister to raise the demand for free flow of funds to Jammu & Kashmir at the key meet with an additional demand to bail out Jammu & Kashmir Government to help it come out from the current phase of cash crunch at treasuries. The cash crunch at the Government treasuries may be resolved timely by the hassle free disbursement of funds from the Centre if brought to its notice seriously but finally situation demands that Jammu & Kashmir Government carries out series of financial reforms to manage its finances efficiently with the planned initiatives to reduce all scopes for occurrence and re-occurrence of cash crisis in the Government departments.
