New Delhi: Harsh Dev Singh, the president of the J&K National Panthers Party, (JKNPP) emerges as a formidable candidate for the chief minister position in Jammu and Kashmir. Ankit Love, the party's chief patron, commends Singh's courageous leadership during recent protests in Udhampur.
Harsh Dev led hundreds of JKNPP members through the streets and bazaars of Udhampur on Saturday. Despite the scorching summer heat, they passionately chanted against the growing failures of the government. The procession made stops at the PHE department and Power department where Dev personally confronted officials, and made them hear the individual grievances of protestors, including severe power cuts and those being billed for electricity use, without having received any power connection whatsoever. The protestors also brought to attention the abject failure in delivering water supply to remote villages in the district.
The protest concluded with an ad hoc meeting offered by Deputy Commissioner (DC) Sachin Kumar Vaishy, who despite having a heavy police guard, respectfully received Dev and hosted over 150 of the protestors inside the DC secretariat assembly hall.
Public demands
In a meeting that lasted nearly an hour, a memorandum pertaining to public demands was submitted to DC Vaishy. Harsh Dev and Sachin Kumar Vaishy co-chaired the meeting, allowing members of the JKNPP protest present to individually speak and discuss their grievances.
DC Vaishy agreed to provide better sewerage, stray dog rescue and litter collection across Udhampur town, especially at Devika Ghats. With the possibility of introducing fines for people littering, and a public awareness campaign.
Clearing a backlog of MGNREGA payments from 2017
He further agreed to expedite pension payments for a blind man from Haridwar that were over 6 months delayed. Vaishy offered to add more permanent bus routes, clear a backlog of MGNREGA payments from 2017, post teachers to rural area schools, resolve issues in food ration distribution, and expedite the repair and construction of dangerous gaps in the mountainous road from Udhampur to Ghordi.
“Only Harsh Dev Singh has the capacity and experience to deliver results, even with no elected assembly in place. He has served over 18 years as an MLA and during his visionary tenure as education minister built over 11,000 new schools in just three years, a world record. There is no reason now that the Panthers Party cannot realistically win enough seats to be a member of a coalition government again. This time there is a serious possibility of at least the first two years of coalition government seeing a Harsh Dev Singh chief ministry and the first to originate from Udhampur. The people want a change.” Love said.
