Coming down heavily on the State Government, the leader of the Opposition in the State Assembly, Ajay Bhatt, said the Chief Minister, Harish Rawat's six-month tenure has been frustrating. "During this period corruption thrived and the Government patronised liquor traders, land grabbers and the mining mafia."
"For instance, the CM has awarded Fl-2 licence to single liquor traders by convening a Cabinet meeting. This enabled them to operate both from Garhwal and Kumaon divisions. We are convinced that the traders had bribed the CM into falling into their line. It all happened when the model code of conduct in view of general election-2014 was in force. This can be counted as one of the monumental achievements of the State Government," Bhatt sarcastically said.
"Hero Motor Corp Company was allowed to have its 214 acres of land allocated to them in 2006 registered in 2014 at the circle rate of year 2006. In 2006, the circle rate was `1000 per square metre while it mounted to `3812 per square metre in 2014. With this, the State has made a dent worth `254 crore into the state exchequer. When we raised the issue, the then Haridwar DM slapped penalty worth Rs 111 crore on the company," he said.
Referring to the law and order, he said over the past six months, mining mafias keep flourishing in the state. "Even mafias are attacking the villagers whenever they dare raise voice against them.
Even the police is lodging counter-FIRs against the hapless villagers as prodded by the mafia. Cases of thefts, dacoities and even murders are on the rise. The women are at the receiving end of the anarchy as unleashed by the State Government. The CM's silence in the matter is eerie," he said.
"Even CM Rawat has failed to promote tourism in the State. The State Government being bereft of a vision for robust tourism, the State's status keeps plummeting in the realm of tourism," Bhatt said.
Dwelling on the recurrence of disasters, he ascribed this to the recently installed infrastructure having collapsed following one or two spells of rain. "The villagers are the worst affected. On the one hand they fail to provide shelter to the disaster-affected families and, on the other, they are on a spending spree involving crores of rupees on cheap publicity," he said.
"Things are dismal for the State on the plane of development as aside from the foundation stones cropping up here and there in every district nothing is happening by way of project implementation. They have spent crores of rupees staging special session at Gairsain, yet no announcement came for the development of Gairsain.
Now they are all set to have a Cabinet meeting at Kedarnath. Crores would be squandered again for what the people mockingly call picnic session with development remaining stuck in the cesspool of callousness," Bhatt said.