Last year this time around 500 Panchayat members had announced their resignation under terrorists threat openly through newspapers/mosques, though the State Government at that time claimed that only a handful of resignations have been received. The success of the peaceful and the successful conduct of Panchayat elections in 2011 after a gap of nearly three decades and the proposed urban local bodies elections before the end of 2012,looked that time has not gone well with the terrorist groups and their handlers across the border. To give effect to the threats and enforce their diktat, a few Panchayat members and Sarpanchs have been killed in terrorist attacks as a result of which about 500 Panchayat members announced their resignation openly. The State of Panchyati Raj Institutions (PRIs) too are in a political slumber leading to hampering the federal continuum through which power devolves form Centre to State and then to district, block and villages. Politically these grass route level institutions have no existence but laws are there which only regimentalise the administration but devoid justice. People might do politics over these elections but a man living in some remote rural area of our State voted just to ensure he gets better roads, power and water. Under these circumstances it is the common man who is getting sandwiched; one side who tells him to boycott the elections and another plays politics. But is there any other option that without having institutions like Panchayats, Municipal Councils or Assemblies that Jammu and Kashmir can be governed? The United Nations has also clearly said in 1953 that any elections held in J and K won’t have any effect on the political issue of Jammu and Kashmir and these elections would be undertaken just to ensure running the internal administration. Lack of awareness in implementing the system, the bureaucratic delays, political interference, economic reasons and social pressures have made the Panchayati Raj dysfunctional even today. The 73rd Constitutional Amendment in the state’s Panchayati Raj Act to empower elected village representatives, however could not automatically become applicable to Jammu and Kashmir because it has its own Constitution which is applicable here concomitantly with the country’s Constitution.
