C ongress vice-president Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday faced a piquant situation here in Jammu when a large number of ‘powerless’ panches and sarpanches erupted in anger and questioned the ‘undue’ delay behind transferring real powers to the Panchayati Raj Institutions even after successfully holding the polls more than three years ago.
Disrupting Rahul Gandhi’s speech first of all, a sarpanch hailing from Bhugterian Panchayat in Ramnagar tehsil of Udhampur district raised his voice highlighting their plight. Identified as Prikshit Singh, the sarpanch accused the State Government headed by Omar Abdullah of not giving them their due rights till date.
Spontaneous ‘act of revolt’ and aggressive posturing triggered chain reaction in the large gathering as several other elected representatives started voicing their concern and demanded answers. Akhtar Hussain, hailing from latti panchayat in Udhampur shouted from his chair, “Do not treat us like lesser mortals. We too are elected representatives, hand over real power to us as per the Constitution.” He said, “We will not wait longer. For last three years, we are only hearing assurances. You are also giving us assurances, give us real power.”
Rahul, who was still making his speech, made desperate efforts to pacify them but in vain. The Congress Ministers and their supporters also tried to raise slogans to silence the dissenting noises but they too failed to cool their tempers. As TV channels focused their cameras on the gathering, Rahul was forced to wind up his speech and the Assembly was called off abruptly.
Earlier in his brief speech, Rahul gave assurances to the elected sarpanches that he would stand behind them and fight their battle by mounting pressure on the State Government to empower them and introduce the 73rd amendment of the Indian Constitution in the State Panchayti Raj Act.
Sensing the mood of the angry representatives, senior Congress leader incharge of J&K Ambika Soni went back to the dais and made an announcement on behalf of Rahul Gandhi that a sum of Rs 10 lakh would be given to each panchayat to carry out the developmental works after taking the nod from the Finance Ministry.
Meanwhile, chairman of the All Jammu & Kashmir Panchayat Conference Shafiq Mir told The Pioneer, “The elected representatives were expecting some thing concrete from Rahul Gandhi’s speech but they were disappointed when there was no clarity.” He said before addressing the gathering Rahul went to see Omar Abdullah and also referred to his meeting in front of the audience. He said Omar Abdullah has never assured us about 73rd amendment. He has failed to empower us in the last three years.
Referring to the statement of the MoS for Panchayati Raj Viqar Rasool, Shafiq Mir said, when the member of Omar Abdullah’s Council of Ministers is making a public statement that powers of none of the 14 departments have been given to the panchayats, on what basis the State Government claims that they have empowered them. He said the ground reality is different and elected panches and sarpanches continue to fight for their rights in the State despite all the hype.