A meeting of the Committee on Estimates of Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly was held here today under the Chairmanship of MLA Mohammad Ashraf Mir to review the functioning of PHE, Irrigation and Flood Control Department.Legislators Mubarak Gul, Hakeem Mohammad Yaseen, Ch. Sukhnandan Kumar, Abdul Majeed Padder, R S Pathania, Altaf Ahmed Wani, Yawar Ahmed Mir and Javed Ahmed Mirchal were present in the meeting.Threadbare discussions were held on overall working of the department including reviewing the status of implementation on various schemes and projects.The Committee directed the concerned authorities to undertake immediate repairing of non-functional filtration plant in the state besides maintaining proper levels of sanitations so that safe drinking water can be provided to the people.Further instructions were also passed to make all defunct water testing laboratories functional besides ensuring regular supply of clean drinking water to all education and health institutions of the state.
The Committee directed Irrigation and Flood Control department to regularly monitor ongoing dredging works on river Jehlum so that works can be completed in its stipulated time frame. The issue of conservation and preservation of Wullar Lake was also taken up in the meeting.Further, the Committee directed for immediate steps to be taken to rationalize staff and transfer policy of the department.Besides, progress on implementation of different projects and schemes including NRDWP, NABARD, MNP, EIDP was also reviewed in the meeting.The members of the Committee also raised various concerns pertaining to their constituencies. Secretary, PHE, Irrigation and Flood Control, Saurabh Bhagat briefed the Committee about the overall functioning of the department, besides physical and financial achievement of the department, and projects and schemes being carried out by the department.Among others, Chief Engineer, PHE, Kashmir, G M Batt, Director Finance, PHE, Irrigation and FC, G M Khan, Senior Engineers and offices of concerned department and Assembly Secretariat were present in the meeting.