Govt puts restrictions on relief supply, Govt lets relief goods rot at JKEDI

The government is creating bottlenecks in the distribution of relief among flood-hit people of the State by asking donors to get No Objection Certificates (NoCs) from bureaucrats for relief goods.
The government has issued a notification under SRO 380 dated September 20, 2014 and sought relief goods be accompanied with the certificate from Principal Resident Commissioner, J&K Government, New Delhi; Deputy Commissioners of the concerned district or any other authority to be notified by Commissioner Commercial Taxes.
Talking to us, a civil society activist and Kashmir Center for Social and Development Studies (KCSDS) member, Shakeel Qalander said it was bizarre that the government was putting regulations on the distribution of relief by asking donors to get NOCs from bureaucrats.
“These bureaucrats were themselves sleeping all these days while ordinary masses were carrying out relief distribution process,” he said. “Now that they have woken up, they are creating hurdles in way of donors.”
The raiders put in way of relief supply are making relief distribution a cumbersome process as obtaining NOCs from the bureaucrats is a difficult task.
The SRO notification issued by the government reads that for the purpose of issuance of certificate, as envisaged under SRO 380, the government had notified Special Relief Commissioners, Additional Commissioner Commercial Taxes (Adm) for Kashmir and Jammu, Managing Director JKI and Deputy Commissioner Commercial Taxes Checkpost Lakhanpur as competent authorities.
Now the airlines too are not accepting to bring relief goods from New Delhi and other parts of India to Srinagar.
In absence of a proper mechanism, these regulations would create further dearth of relief goods in flood-hit Kashmir.
Meanwhile, relief goods at Srinagar airport are lying unclaimed as the NGOs and donors are caught in red-tape.
The government has also exempted relief goods from sales taxes would only for a limited duration from September 8 to September 30.
Qalander said the government should extend the date of exemption on sales taxes to the relief goods as a large number of donors would be sending the relief material in October, November and December.
According to SRO 380, in exercise of powers conferred by sub-section 2 of section 3 of the Jammu and Kashmir Entry Tax on Goods Act, 2000, the government has exempted goods to be imported into the State for relief and rehabilitation of the floods victims from the levy of income tax.
Commissioner Commercial Taxes, Kifayaz Hussain Rizvi told Rising Kashmir none of the trucks carrying relief goods had been stopped by the government at Lakhanpur.
“A total of 300 trucks carrying relief goods were cleared,” he said. “We are re-checking and ensuring that genuine goods are sent as we came across a case wherein a businessman pretending to send relief goods sent 42 inverters into the State to save taxes.”
Rizvi said this was a one-off case and government was putting in all out efforts to ensure that all bottlenecks are removed.
Kashmir was hit by a one of the worst floods in a century on September 6 and the government has been found wanting not only in rescuing the marooned people but also in distributing relief.
A day after the government issued the order, Chief Minister Omar Abdullah tweeted that he had received report from airport regarding the relief stuck there.
“Pls take AIRWAY BILL NO. & valid photo ID to pick up your consignment No NGO registration is required but without AWB No & ID airlines will not hand over material, in fact will repatriate back to sender,” the chief minister tweeted. “Some people trying to pick up relief without supporting documents & that is causing the problem so please help by carrying as above.”

Govt lets relief goods rot at JKEDI

While the flood-ravaged people of Kashmir are craving for relief assistance, the State government is dumping abundant relief goods at Jammu and Kashmir Entrepreneurship Development Institute (JKEDI) at Sempora with huge quantities of perishable items going waste.
The government has dumped a large quantity of relief goods at JKEDI and officials working there are acting as hoarders.
Sources said that for a locality that needs 100 bags of relief goods, these on-duty officials sent 5 bags.
The flood-ravaged people said the government needs to look into relief distribution and ensure that some type of mechanism was there to ensure that the relief goods reach to the needy.
“The people incharge need to be changed or at least the mechanism of this kind of relief distribution should be changed,” a civil society activist and Kashmir Center for Social and Development Studies (KCSDS) member, Shakeel Qalander said.
He said it was unfortunate that while people were longing for relief assistance, perishable items were rotting at JKEDI.
Kashmir was hit by a one of the worst floods in a century on September 6 and the government has been found wanting not only in rescuing the marooned people but also in distributing relief.