Roll back disengagement orders of technical experts of H&UD or face consequences: Harsh

 STATE TIMES NEWS
JAMMU: Accusing the Housing and Urban Development (H and UD) of misconduct and malfeasance, Harsh Dev Singh, Chairman JKNPP and former Minister, has strongly condemned the engagement of retired persons by the said department in Housing For All (HFA) Mission and disengagement of the regularly appointed candidates in the most arbitrary and unlawful manner.
Elucidating his point, he said that 21 technical experts including Engineers, Town Planners, MIS, GIS, capacity building co-coordinators and Social Development Specialists were appointed in February 2015 under Rajiv Awas Yojana (RAY) during Governor’s rule by following the proper selection process and in accordance with the recommendations of the selection committee constituted for the purpose.
He said that the said candidates were regularly appointed and were performing their duties until recently when the government ordered their disengagement on the ground that the RAY scheme has been revamped as HFA Scheme by the Government of India.
Harsh regretted that the harassment of the said technical experts had started immediately after the formation of government in March, 2015 with the new dispensation averse to the continuance of the said candidates appointed during Governor’s Rule.
He said that their appointment was opposed by the new dispensation on the pretext that the RAY scheme under which they had been appointed had been converted into HFA scheme and hence their services were no longer required.
He said that after harassing the said appointees for a few months they were eventually disengaged around a month back on frivolous grounds.
Describing the logic of the Housing Department, for disengagement of the said regularly appointed youth as highly absured and contrary to the canons of equity and jurisprudence, Harsh called for revocation of the termination orders of the said youth at the earliest.
He said that it was unheard that change in the nomenclature of the scheme should be a ground for disengagement of duly appointed youth. He said that the helmsman wanted to recruit their favorites by disengaging the regularly appointed candidates which was intolerable besides being legally untenable.
He cautioned the H and UD Department to roll back its disengagement order as the Panthers would no longer tolerate any further exploitation of the educated youth. He further expressed his dismay that while the regularly appointed educated youth were disengaged, the retired persons re-appointed by the government under RAY have been allowed to continue in HFA.
Strongly condemning the highly unfair and mischievous conduct of the H and UD Department, Harsh appealed to the Governor to personally intervene so as to expose the vested interests and to ensure justice to the aggrieved candidates. He said that the candidates appointed under RAY scheme could not have been disengaged as the spirit of scheme remains the same and only nomenclature has been changed.
He said that even GOI vide his office order no. 11011/30/2015-HFA-3/FTS 13334 dated 3rd August, 2015 has asked all state governments and Union Territories to utilise the resources both human as well as infrastructure of RAY into HFA but the new government refused to entertain the same. He regretted that whereas all other states had retained their technical cells working previously under RAY and continued them under HFA, the helmsman in J and K for political and other vested interests chose to terminate them.
Harsh further apprised the Governor that the number of cities proposed to be developed under HFA had also been increased to 25 including the six cities earlier identified under RAY. He said that requirement of man power and technical experts had also increased but the vested interests wanted to engage all of their favorites at the cost of meritorious candidates.
Cautioning the H and UD Department against any further persecution or exploitation of the educated youth, Singh said that Panthers Party would fight for the cause of the said aggrieved candidates in Jammu as well as in Delhi till their disengagement orders issued arbitrarily and illegally were rolled back and they were re-instated.