Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Tuesday lashed out at the Omar Abdullah led government for its indifference towards the problems of the food sufferers said the way loot, embezzlement of even relief materials is happening from the hands of ruling party politicians is enough to suggest their shameless attitude.“The whole system has badly damaged during last six years. Now they have miserably failed to respond to present tragedy. The ruling party politicians are still not coming out of their old practices of loot and dirty methods to cash in on the sufferings of the people that too after drowning them,” the party chief spokesperson, Naeem Akhtar said while interacting with the party workers in Gogaldara, Baderkoot, Kolhama and Tomberhama in Tangmarg area of north Kashmir.He said with a view on the forthcoming elections the government is also making backdoor appointments and transfers of their blue-eyed officials particularly at village levels. “Even the some ruling party leaders are now seeking “probe” into appointments made in various departments by their own government, owning to widespread corruption,” he said.
He said hundreds of truck loads of rice are missing from the godowns of Kashmir and the officers who are known supporters of the National Conference have been found involvement in the rice embezzlement. With the result, he said, relief is not reaching out to the real sufferers. Also the NC politicians are inflating the damage of their workers to get them more benefits and the actual victims have been left high and dry by an insensible government, he said.“There are reports that ministers representing constituencies where there have no flood whisked away hundreds of truck-loads of rice and are distributing it through their sons, wards and close associates. They are presenting the government relief as personal favor or party contribution,” he added.He said the Apex Court appointed panel has categorically stated that on ground even the assessment of the damage of properties has not been completed across the state leave aside providing the people any relief. He said the government has even failed to distribute free ration properly in most of the areas of the state and only those who have not suffered due floods are being benefited. “The government is distributing relief on the political considerations,” he said.
The PDP chief spokesperson described the Omar Abdullah led government has not been yet able to clear the civil secretariat. The epicenter of governance in the state, he said is of the muck and slush resulted due to flooding leave aside making other offices and areas operational.“As more than one month has passed since the deluge struck Kashmir, the civil secretariat and other important offices in Srinagar are yet to be cleaned and made operational this shows how serious this government is with the affairs of the state,” he added.
In the civil secretariat neither electricity nor any communication systems or any other facility has been restored till this date.
Speaking about the loss caused by floods in Tangmarg area he said: “there has been tremendous loss of crops, horticulture and especially tourism and tourism related services which need to be considered for compensation.
Naeem said only thing they are trying to make itself visible is through newspaper advertisements making tall claims which are otherwise baseless akin to adding insult to the injury. “Have not the floods touched majority of the people in Kashmir why should this government try to impress by wasting money on advertisements when they are actually doing nothing substantial for them?” he said.
Naeem said the National Conference-led government has failed to respond either to rising waters or the aftermath and the real work which one should have expected from any democratic government to do in the times of crisis is still missing. Instead, he said, the people have to face huge troubles in locating address of the missing government.
He said the government which left the people on the mercy of God during the deluge is still unmoved with the sufferings of the flood victims, which is highly unfortunate, disgusting. “They have earlier badly failed in the rescue operations and had not the youth risked their lives and saved the people this government had done everything to increase the tragedies manifolds because of its gross insensitivity and callousness. And, now its response to post-flood scenario is more pathetic and inhuman,” he said.
Adding the complicity of this government in breakdown of age old flood control system is coming through news reports almost daily and is enough to suggest that the Omar Abdullah government is directly responsible for drowning the whole Kashmir. He said even senior minister in the state government, Taj Mohuidin has also said Standard Operations Procedure (SOP) was not followed, no beats were formed and no vigilance was maintained on the bunds which otherwise used to be a norm in the past during floods.
He said the government had not paid any attention to continuous weather warning systems which had predicted flash-floods in Kashmir and other parts of the state. “This National Conference-led government also slept over the 2012 report by the Flood Control Department of the state which had warned of flash-floods in next five years. They will have to do a lot of answering for this criminal negligence which resulted into unimaginable devastation of properties, infrastructure and human loss,” he added.
Mohammad Abbas Wani, party’s candidate for Gulmarg constituency; party leader, Prof Abdul Jabbar; Abdul Aziz Dar, Zone president and other leaders were also present on the occasion. (GNS)