Kashmir weary of leaders elected with 10% vote: Jitendra

Union minister Jitendra Singh Sunday remarked that Kashmir is weary of leaders elected with “mere 10 per cent vote” who then make it to the Lok Sabha or state assembly with vested interest of perpetuating political dominance by a few families or individuals.

Taking a dig at Kashmiri leaders, he also said politiciansof Kashmir are still “clinging on to the past”, without realisingthat the common voter comprising 70 per cent of youth has already moved on.

   

“Kashmir is weary of leaders elected with mere 10 percent vote, who then make it to Lok Sabha or state assembly, with the vestedinterest of perpetuating political dominance by a few families andindividuals,” he said.

The Minister of State for Personnel said if an election isheld in a “free atmosphere” with reasonable voter turnout, peoplewill outright reject the politicians who have, over the last several decades,thrived on low voter turnout.             

When asked about his often repeated statement that   militancy in Kashmir is in its last phase,he said in an interview to Rajya Sabha TV Sunday that nobody in the Valleywants militancy to continue, except for a handful of politicians.

“They have developed vested interest in contesting andwinning elections in an insecure atmosphere, but people have now understoodtheir selfish designs and are keen to get rid of them,” he said.

Refuting allegations of “weakening” the Right ToInformation Act through the RTI Amendment Bill introduced by him in the LokSabha recently, Singh said the Bill is meant to streamline and institutionalisethe functioning of the Information Commission.

The RTI Act 2005 was framed by the UPA government in haste,and the Modi government is only trying to fill in the missing links, heargued. 

Reiterating the Centre’s emphasis on “performance withintegrity”, the Union minister also justified the recent orders forpremature retirement of officials whose integrity was under doubt or theperformance not found up to the mark.He also defended the government’s ‘lateralentry’ mode, which relates to appointment of private sector specialists,   saying in the emerging scenario, Indiadeserves the best of talent from whatever source available, to handle some ofthe most “innovative, original and specialised” schemes introduced byPrime Minister Narendra Modi.

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