SRINAGAR: The Raj Bhavan running the show for little over a month in Jammu and Kashmir has, so far, not invited any major murmur of dissent from the people in Srinagar. After the collapse of the PDP-BJP coalition government on June 20, Governor NN Vohra and his advisors BB Vyas, K Vijay Kumar and Khurshid Ahmad Ganai are looking after administrative matters in the militancy-hit state.
Vohra, who is at the Raj Bhavan since 2008, has distributed portfolios to his three advisors. The quartet holds regular review meetings of the government departments for their smooth functioning.
The Governor’s first decision was to bring accountability among the government workforce — biometric attendance system was made mandatory in every government office.
Vohra and his advisors are accessible to the people at public darbars, where they listen to grievances and complaints of the people and then instruct officials to sort them out. “The accessibility to Governor’s advisors is easy. It was not the case with the ministers during the Mehbooba Mufti government’s rule. The ministers, especially those from the PDP, were arrogant and hardly listened to us,” says Baramulla resident Abdul Jabbar, who met the Advisors recently.
With only four men running the show, the VIP culture is mostly subdued. Officials are also relieved that they can attend work instead of running to residences of ministers every now and then.
Gone are the long cavalcades of ministers that often led to traffic snarls. Mehbooba’s fleet included 21 cars, the ministers were allocated as many as 161 cars. Fuel and maintenance bills used to cross Rs 3 crore annually, sources say. Another 45 cars were allocated to political leaders appointed as vice-chairpersons of boards and PSUs.
“The money saved is being spent on public works. The pace of developmental activities has increased. Instructions were passed on to officials for finishing key projects on time,” says a top official.
In fact, the Governor’s official Twitter handle has been receiving complaints about irregularities and wrongdoings of the previous PDP-BJP coalition government.