Batting for effective establishment of rural and urban self-governing bodies in Jammu and Kashmir, Governor N N Vohra today said this would lead to a decentralised democratic framework at the grass roots level in the state.
The establishment of Panchayati Raj and municipal administration shall provide an opportunity for people to become productively involved in the planning and implementing of developmental schemes, Vohra said in his address to the state on the eve of Republic Day.
"I have strongly believed and consistently stressed that the empowerment of people at the grass roots level and enabling Panchayats to effectively participate in the planning and implementation of development programmes would result in promoting the welfare of entire rural population," he said.
The Governor observed that the elections to Panchayats, held after a gap of nearly three decades, had witnessed a turnout of 80 per cent to elect about 33,000 Panches and Sarpanches.
He hoped that the long-awaited elections to local bodies and other institutional reforms would be carried out in the coming months.
Stating that terrorism in the state had affected the administrative functioning, Vohra said it was necessary to "fill up this gap and regain the required momentum", especially when people "are getting increasingly impatient".
The Governor observed that despite constraints, the state was able to achieve a growth rate of 6.14 per cent during 2012-13, higher than the national average.
However, for Jammu and Kashmir to forge ahead on a sustained basis, "we need to do much better and tackle serious challenges, particularly the problems of unemployment and the acute shortage of power in Jammu and Kashmir", he said.
