Regional discrimination will not be tolerated in J&K: LG Manoj Sinha

Sinha also assured that justice will be done for the families of the three youths from Rajouri who are believed to have been killed in an alleged fake encounter.

Regional discrimination in administration will not be tolerated at any level in Jammu and Kashmir, Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha said here on Monday as he vowed to use technology to curb the menace of corruption.

“There is zero tolerance for discrimination between Kashmir and Jammu or dividing the union territory on any basis. It will not be tolerated at any level — be it at the level of chief secretary or the LG — as long as I am here,” Sinha told reporters here.

He also said the administration will use technology to weed out corruption from government offices. “Where there is man (manual work), there is corruption. We will be using maximum technology for ensuring transparency in government,” he added.

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Sinha also assured that justice will be done for the families of the three youths from Rajouri who are believed to have been killed in an alleged fake encounter. “The Army has ordered its own inquiry and the administration is doing its own probe. I want to assure that justice will be done,” he said The LG was interacting with the media on the forthcoming launch of ‘Back To Village — Three’ (B2V3) in the union territory for taking the governance to the doorsteps of the common masses.

He said the B2V3 will be launched on the Gandhi Jayanti, but a 20-day awareness campaign about the programme was already underway in all the 20 districts of the union territory.

Sinha said the previous editions of the Back to Village have been successful endeavours as they found mention in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ‘Mann ki Baat’ and Independence Day speech. “In the first edition, there was enthusiasm among the people and the atmosphere was festive. In the second edition, the aspirations of the people rose and they felt everything would be done through this mode.

“A lot of work has been done … We have put all the works in the public domain and want people to give us feedback on these works,” he said.

He said Rs 10 lakh have been released to each of the over 4,000 panchayats in the union territory for immediate use in the local areas. “The panchayats can decide on what to use these funds.”

On the committee formed for studying the business losses, Sinha said they have submitted the report. “A package will be announced soon for Jammu and Kashmir, (the magnitude of) which has never been before,” he said, adding the businesses in the union territory had suffered over the past 15 to 20 years

Sinha said as part of transparent and responsive governance, it has been decided that every Wednesday the district level officers will be conducting public hearings at sub-divisional level.

“If there are three sub divisions in a district, the DC and SP will be attending the public hearing at one Sub division while Additional DC and Additional SP will be doing the same in another sub division and likewise. The next week these officers will rotate the sub divisions,” he said.

This is being done on an experimental basis and if successful, “we want to take it to the block level,” he added.