SRINAGAR: After joining hands to fight communalism in the State, the business chambers of Kashmir and Jammu in a rare show of unity on Tuesday asked central government to declare whole Jammu and Kashmir as Free Economic Zone and return all power projects being run “illegally” by NHPC in the State.
“Jammu Chambers of Commerce and Industry (JCCI) and Kashmir Chambers of Commerce and Industry (KCCI) demand that central government should take steps to declare the whole J&K as a Free Economic Zone (FEZ) to enable traders of the State to do business with all countries in central Asia including China, Russia and Iran,” KCCI president Mushtaq Wani and JCCI president Rakesh Gupta said while addressing a joint press conference here.
Maintaining that FEZ will not only benefit J&K but the entire country, they said, the central government should form a committee to check its feasibility and work out the modalities.
“Till the time FEZ is formed, items traded through cross Line of Control (LoC) trade between two parts of Kashmir should be based on a negative list of not more than 50 items and not a positive list of 21 items which is the case now ,” Wani and Gupta said.
“This step will ensure free trade and not a restricted trade. It will ensure benefit to traders on both sides as we have been the sufferers economically from 1947,” added Wani and Gupta.
At present traders involved in cross-LoC trade can trade only 21 items.
The chambers of Kashmir and Jammu also demanded that central government should return of all the power projects, which are run by NHPC illegally in the state.
They said NHPC is running the power projects on adhoc basis as there is no agreement for continuing their running through NHPC and that Jammu and Kashmir State Power Development Corporation (JKPSDC) is capable of running the projects.
Wani and Gupta said return of power projects will be one of the main step to ensure economic development of the State.
“The money spent by the state government to buy power at exorbitant price from NHPC will be available to the J&K government for development purposes,” they said.
Asserting that there was no justification in not returning the power projects whose agreement was over, Gupta said, " We have always had a begging bowl in our hand. The central and state government has not compensated us, then at least return us our property. We will run them and earn money and we will not ask anything from the Centre”.
This is the first time that traders from Jammu have joined the demand for return of NHPC-run power projects in the State.
The previous J&K government headed by Omar Abdullah had demanded return of three power projects -- 690-MW Salal, 480-MW Uri (1) and 390-MW Dulhasti.
The Common Minimum Programme (CMP) framed by PDP and BJP for running coalition government in the State also mentions that coalition government will explore modalities for transfer of Dulhasti and Uri hydro power projects to J&K as suggested by the Rangarajan Committee report.