Former Minister and senior Congress leader Raman Bhalla on Wednesday assailed the BJP Govt for utterly failing in deliverance, saying it has lost confidence and mandate of the people of Jammu.The 2014 excitement, expectations and display is terribly missing with disregard growing among people due to policy paralysis of the Govt, which is struggling to put its act together after plunging J&K into unprecedented political and administrative crisis,” Bhalla said while addressing workers at Bahu Fort Poonchi Mohalla in Gandhi Nagar Assembly Constituency. Speaking on the occasion, Bhalla said that the people of Jammu are feeling let down and betrayed, as their problems are accumulating with each passing day. He said the arrogance of power and lack of governance has distanced the BJP from its core agenda, people of Jammu hugely realizing the mistake of putting them into the cradle of administrators.
“For over six decades, the BJP had been exploiting the Jammu sentiment by crying hoarse over the so-called discrimination, deprivation and neglect but when it came to delivering, they just raised their hands”, he said, adding that not only the BJP pushed the region to backwards but also turned out as a big obstacle in its development and progress. He blamed BJP Govt mis-governance and mismanagement which has added miseries to people. “I want to ask BJP, how many promises made by them during their election campaign were fulfilled,” Bhalla questioned. Bhalla said that the basic needs of one’s life becoming unaffordable day by day due to soaring inflation. And the worst hit are the housewives, whose monthly budget has gone awry due to spiraling price hike of vegetables and fruits due to inflation. Households in the City are finding it hard to manage their monthly budget because of skyrocketing prices, he added.
Bhalla alleged that BJP betrayed and always took Jammu people for granted. It has humiliated Jammuites, since this party came to power at the Centre and subsequently in J&K. Reacting to the repeated statements of Union Home Minister Amit Shah that state-hood to Jammu and Kashmir shall be restored, Bhalla said under the garb of abrogation of Articles 370 & 35- A, BJP has disempowered the people of Jammu by down grading the status of Jammu & Kashmir state to Union Territory. He termed it as gross betrayal, unfortunate, sad and unprecedented. He said BJP has created bad chapter of the history by lowering the status of state of Jammu & Kashmir to two UTs. “Voices were raised in Jammu, always complaining of discrimination and more over demanding Jammu as separate state but the BJP instead of respecting the people totally ignored their demands, sentiments and bifurcated & downgraded princely state into two UTs,” former Minister said.He said frequent statements of BJP leaders hurt the people of Jammu, when it is said statehood will be restored, when normalcy is restored. He asked does statehood put any hindrance to take steps to restore normalcy in the state?
Bhalla alleged that BJP is shedding crocodile’s tears for people of Jammu after down grading their status to Union Territory. It is gross betrayal of the huge mandate given by the people of Jammu in 2014 Assembly elections and then 2019 Parliament elections, he added.BJP has inflicted severe wounds on the body politic of the state , it must be reversed in the national interest,” he said . He also warned that this could become a festering wound and cause more problems than it is intended to solve. The Government must restore, statehood status to the Jammu and Kashmir. The people will give their reply to the BJP at the most opportune time, he maintained. People will answer them during polls the way they are penetrating into everything,” Bhalla said and demanded conduct of Assembly polls saying that let the dust be clear.He also added that people of J&K especially the youth, have been befooled and they are feeling alienated due to unemployment and no future security. Under the leadership of Sonia Gandhi, results in Jharkhand, Maharashtra and Haryana have showed BJP the real face,” he said and stressed for conduct of Assembly elections in Jammu and Kashmir.
Expressing resentment over the stalling of mobile internet services besides imposing several other unwarranted restrictions in the peaceful districts of Jammu region, Bhalla said Govt can’t give collective punishment to society for the sins of a handful of offenders. If there are apprehensions of misuse of internet services by miscreants, this doesn’t mean that the entire system should be made to suffer. You can’t shutdown the internet services every time you receive a report that some unknown people has posted some antinational text on social media”, he observed. Asserting that internet connectivity had become indispensible in the present day set up, Bhalla said its stalling had adversely impacted the normal life as broadband facility was not available everywhere. He said that with students and teachers excessively dependent upon internet services for academic activities, the snapping of such services had caused immense problems in Education sector. Likewise, the social and economic life had also been thrown out of gear.