Failed Jammu BJP needs overhaul; can’t ride Modi-Shah wave always!

DOST KHAN / ANCHOR

Jammu has a reason to celebrate accomplishment of two major promises of the Bharatiya Janata Party-abrogation of Article 370 and successful and sustained campaign on the construction of Ram Mandir in Ayodhya. But can the Jammu BJP take any moral grandstanding over these achievements, given the disgusting role of its leaders in over three years’ coalition ministry between March 2015 and June 2018? Obviously not! Because most of its ministers ended up as second fiddlers to their Kashmiri masters, indulged in acts of omission and commission and bitterly failed on deliverance front and safeguarding the legitimate interests of the Jammu region.
But for the successful implementation of centrally sponsored schemes like LPG connections to poor and direct benefit mechanism of various utility services, courtesy Government of India, the local BJP was found wanting on governance front. Many of its prominent, but unscrupulous, ministers kept pushing their personal agenda rather than upholding public interest and trust.
The Jammu BJP played the worst ever second-fiddle role while partnering government with the PDP. It compromised on fundamentals of the BJP ethos; it betrayed its core constituency on all the fronts; it became a partner in inflicting discrimination with the already discriminated region; it bartered the honour and dignity of Dogras for few loaves of power; it ditched its own electors in order to placate ‘masters’ in Srinagar; it preferred silence when sovereignty and integrity of Mother India was challenged and bruised under the patronage of its coalition partner; it did all that the PDP wanted it to do.
The BJP’s biggest betrayal with Jammu was its complicity with the PDP in portraying self-respecting Dogras as rapists in the unfortunate Rassana case. It failed in getting the case transferred to CBI to counter the conspiracy angle. It became partner in the withdrawal of cases against 11,000 stone-pelters.
Having been crying hoarse over discrimination, the Jammu BJP ministers failed in pushing forward the work on AIIMS and three Government Medical Colleges sanctioned for Kathua, Doda and Rajouri districts. Its ministers did virtually nothing in implementation of the flagship programme of Deen Dayal Upadhyaya Gram Jyoti Yojna, designed to provide continuous power supply to rural areas. How would they define their roles in expediting the work on the Artificial River Tawi Lake Project and its allied project with regard to beautification of the Suryaputri water body? It walked at snail’s pace with regard to SMART City project that could have benefitted Jammu the most, being the hugely thronged pilgrim destination of North India.
The local BJP bruised the psyche of the Jammu region by remaining silent over the directions passed by the PDP Chief Minister to Deputy Commissioners of Jammu, asking them, “…, not to provide any police protection for eviction of tribals without the approval obtained by TAD; till a formal tribal policy is formulated and issued, tribal population shall not be disturbed or dislocated; in case it becomes absolutely necessary to dislocate any member or family of tribal population, the same should be done in prior consultation with the TAD; and, given the misuse of Section 188 RPC and Animal Cruelty Act against the tribals in a situation when animal rearing is their profession and they are required to transport their animals from one place to another, they (officers) should take due care while dealing with such cases”. The issue was crucial to Jammu demography. BJP did nothing about illegally settled Rohingyas in Jammu, who keep posing a security threat in the Temple City.
And if at all the Jammu BJP succeeded in accomplishing any agenda, it was purely personal. The acts of omission and commission are not hidden from the people, especially the BJP and the RSS cadre in Jammu, who can very well spell the definition of loot and corruption engineered during the coalition rule of over three years. The era saw every activity from transfer to allotment of contracts and employment to implementation of various schemes being done in lieu of consideration.
For their failures, the Jammu people have shown BJP the place it actually deserved during the recently held Block Development Council elections. Out of 310 positions, it managed only 81 Chairpersons and lost the face. Before it loses its postal address in Jammu region, the central leadership should get up from the deep slumber and carry out massive pruning and overhaul. The Jammu BJP cannot always ride on the popularity and accomplishments of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and National President cum Home Minister Amit Shah.