2014 is still haunting us, as its deluge was on its wings todecimate us like straws. Providential salvation came soon, despite ourwaywardness and defiance to divine commands, of course, many dwelling unitscrumbled and lay flat on the ground like rubble. Still, this fatal guestcontinued to be in our houses to remind us of our doom.
Of course, thanks were due to many voluntary organizations,who took to rescue work and vowing to build Kashmir brick by brick. We sawforward to the governments, state and central, they seemed to say grace thattheir citizens were drowning. The insipid assistance wore a pale look and wehad to be firm in our determination to believe in self-help. Babus walked in alofty gait and king’s and queen’s mood. In a coward ostrich policy, theymurdered their phones in a switch-off mode, so that we don’t call them. Our owncolleagues did not reply us and did not stand by us in that worst adversarystyle.
All the same, we had none to rely upon, except the greatestsaviour, Allah, who pardoned our sins soon, when supplication went up from ableeding heart; blessings fell down.
The uproar was the outcome of the post- ramifications as towhy do Jehlum become, angry with us and it girds its loin to annihilate ourrace. The Jehlum being a treasure of many Godly blessings, started to becalled; ‘an unwanted flow of water’. Though this statement is unwanted,unscientific and uncultured to call a flowing river ‘a useless entity’.
The foremost ramification was to find the reason for uproaring the Jehlum. A reply of consensus was that the Jehlum has carried withit silt, mud etc. for its entire age & the unavoidable dredging was neverdone.
It has narrowed the depth and width of the Jhelum leavingits capacity to 30,000 cusecs, while it carried 1 lakh cusecs in 2014. Itoverflowed its banks and entered every home in almost whole Srinagar to make amonster out of it.
Now the grudging euphoria comes to the mind of authoritiesin Srinagar and Delhi, involving thousands of crores of rupees. Evidently, thescheme was from the origin up to Baramulla. Necessary tenders were floated anda Kolkata company came forward in the codal-framework. The dredging lost thegrip on speed and 2014 seemed unable to have opened the eyes of the babus whomattered, leaving the future of the lives and property of millions of innocentKashmiris, who represented every unit of age from infants up to the senile raceof the society, to a fatal menace.
The prestigious newspaper Greater Kashmir alerted us on 16thinstant in a banner news column that government has spent Rs 71 crores out ofRs 1500 crores in three years. This was a World Bank-funded reconstructionprogramme now only thirteen months away from the deadline. The frequentshifting of CEO’s and the wastage of a lot of time of the DPRs (Detailedproject reports) is said to be hindrance which hampered the progress of thereconstruction work.
The completion work being 30th June 2020, spending more thanRs 1400 crores in 13 months appears to be tall order given the performance sofar’ (GK). There are tall claims of achievement announced by Dr Raghav Langer,the Chief Executive Officer of the project. We have every reason for being sadthat the inefficiency of the government is primarily responsible for the slowprogress of the project. The preparations of DPRs has proved a white elephantfor the government.
World Bank has also conveyed dismay for this. Now eighteenmonths extension is claimed to be sought from Economic Affairs Committee ofFinance Ministry, GOI.
‘Kon Jeeta Hai Teray Zulf ke Sar honay Tak’.
The people have reason to fear another deluge, so they arepushed to the wailing-wall to atone their sins.